


Once Upon A Time In China

by rosieblue



Category: Xiaolin Showdown (Cartoon)
Genre: Biracial Omi, Black Raimundo, Gen, collection of unrelated oneshots, or as regular as they can get with superpowers, other characters occasionally appear, regular teenage shenanigans
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2020-08-19 16:55:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 63,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20213140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosieblue/pseuds/rosieblue
Summary: The Xiaolin Dragons are a fearsome group of teenagers with a hefty destiny on their shoulders, but at the end of the day they're only teenagers. The thing is, sometimes teenagers do dumb shit.Chapter Eighteen: First First ImpressionsChapter Nineteen: Jack Spicer Gets A Job





	1. Omi's Confession

**Author's Note:**

> The whole slang thing with Omi really irks me and reeks of racism so I'm changing it. Also, this one is a bit short. That's it.

Clay did not, under any circumstances, consider himself the suspicious type. He just wasn’t.

Whenever he spotted Raimundo innocently strolling by, he didn’t think the boy was planning something, although he definitely was. The same went for Kimiko, whenever he saw her sneaking into the Wu vault and definitely not borrowing the Tiger Claws for an impromptu mall trip.

The only one who never gave him, or anyone really, the reason for any doubts was Omi.

Omi was a kid after all and his interests were pretty much singular. He liked to read, take photos, maybe play some very selective video games, and just chill. Very much like most fourteen year-olds on the planet.

So, when Clay saw—more honestly, heard—Omi on the phone one day, a little breathy and shy, he knew something was up. This just wasn’t him. Omi never got shy, even when he probably should have.

The cowboy then took a page out of his other two friends’ books and lingered behind a wall, listening. Not eavesdropping, of course. Clay would never eavesdrop. He was just making sure Omi was okay.

Curiously, he was also wondering how Omi was talking to. When Kimiko bought him a phone for his birthday, the only numbers he’d since saved there were his, Kimiko’s, Raimundo’s, Master Fung’s, Jermaine’s, and oddly Jack Spicer’s cousin Megan’s number.

Since he lived only a few partitions away from most of his friends, Omi only ever called Jermaine or Megan. Raimundo found that cute, as did Kimiko, and Clay knew why. They were the only other people Omi knew who were his exact age.

This time, however, he didn’t sound like he was talking to either one of them.

“Yes, dude”, Omi was saying, which Clay found odd. “I know, I know, Megan said to not tell but I had to tell you!"

He paused, huffing.

"Well, yeah, it's kind of the point", Omi said, with an impressive sarcastic tone. "But I still don't see it, though, you know?"

Another pause came, but this one was coupled with a few hiccuping laughs. It made Clay smile too because this was one of the rare times he saw Omi acting like a regular teenager.

"Yeah, dude", Omi said, scoffing. "It's not my fault though; don’t shoot the messenger!”

With that, the teenager hung up and went on his merry way. After he left, Clay finally breathed his sigh of relief. At least, it wasn’t something that warranted suspicion.

Still he felt uneasy, though. Walking away, Clay realized why. Did Omi—did Omi just use perfectly applied slang?

* * *

Clay wasn’t an eavesdropper or a suspicious person and, among other things, he was also never a gossip. Unless a situation required it, of course, and right now it was one of those situations.

He had to share his recent odd findings with his friends, so he was currently on a mission to find either Kimiko or Raimundo. It had been fifteen minutes when he finally bumped into the latter.

“Dude, you seen Omi?”, the other boy asked. “I need his help with a girl.”

Though he’d prepared to immediately speak and not be interrupted, Clay was stupefied now. First, he heard Omi speaking perfect slang and now, if he wasn't mistaken, he'd heard Raimundo say he needed Omi's help with a girl. He wouldn't be surprised if Kimiko came to tell him she was into country music now.

Clay blinked twice. “Come again?”

“I’m not proud of it, okay”, Raimundo said, pissed off. “But she doesn’t know English and my Cantonese is quite frankly shit. I need help!”

“Okay then”, the cowboy said, digesting the information and nodding. “We can get to your problem later. Right now, we have some bigger fish to fry. Big as Dallas big!”

Raimundo gave him a look and a raised eyebrow. “Do we really? Every moment I’m losing here is precious, so if you have something bigger than that—”

“Omi knows how to use slang”, Clay said, stopping the other boy in his tracks. “Perfectly too. Not one mistake, not exaggerated replacement. He _knows_.”

Though Raimundo had been walking away as he spoke, the words stopped him in place. He seemed to not understand at first but when he did, Clay saw him go through the five stages of grief. Currently, he was stuck on anger.

“That little shit!”, he yelled. “I was going to go fucking crazy over finding him an actual class that teaches conversational English and you’re telling me he _knows_!”

“Who knows what?”, Kimiko said, walking in and joining the conversation. She took one ear-pod out of her ears and gave them a look. “You know you two have been yelling right? There better be a good reason.”

Both boys shared a look, trying to decide who should speak first. Clay sighed and opened his mouth but was unceremoniously interrupted.

“Clay says Omi knows slang”, Raimundo began, in that fake-cheery tone he always took when he was too angry. “Hear that, girl? _Omi_ knows fucking slang!”

Kimiko dropped her ear-pod. “No, that can’t be right—are you guys trying to prank me again?”

“Nope”, Clay said, shaking his head. “Heard him talking on the phone and he was speaking it, all perfect like. Not one mistake.”

Of course, his friends forgot about everything he was saying the minute he mentioned the eavesdropping. Rolling his eyes, Clay anticipated the reactions as he saw the shared look.

“Clayton!”, Kimiko said, using the old nickname he hated and Jessie naturally popularized. “You were eavesdropping!”

Raimundo pretended to wipe a tear. “Our little boy is growing up, darling! Next thing you know he’ll be joining us slacking off on chores.”

“Okay, okay”, the cowboy said, stopping the laughter before the original subject was forgotten. “If you’ve had your fun, let’s get back to the actual situation.”

Kimiko cleared her throat. “Oh yeah. Why do you think he does that then?”

Raimundo and Clay shared a look, both thinking. The latter scratched his jaw, brain going to overdrive trying to understand why his friend was hiding something this insignificant.

It was unusual. Omi never hid things from them, even when he probably should have. He was an over-sharer by nature. So, why did he hide perfecting his slang from them?

“Maybe he’s a little embarrassed”, Kimiko suggested, speaking what was on his mind. “We did make fun of him a lot for that.”

Clay tilted his head. “Hold on now, we weren’t the ones telling him how the cow ate the cabbage.”

At that statement, both he and Kimiko, whose nose had twitched at the metaphor but agreed nonetheless, turned to face their third friend, who was already crossing his arms.

“Sure, make me out to be the bully again, that’s really original”, Raimundo said, rolling his eyes. “We all know there’s one bully in this temple and her name is Kimiko.”

Said girl gave a loud gasp. “Me? When have I ever bullied someone?”

“You made me get rid of all my pants”, he countered. “You said they were hideous, which was _your_ opinion which I never cared for it, and when I didn’t do what you wanted, you burned them. Class-A bully behavior.”

Clay snorted at the memory, one of his fondest at the temple because it was the one fight he wasn’t involved in. “Yeah, Kim, you gotta admit that was a bit mean.”

“I was doing you a favor”, Kimiko said, squinting. “What, you really expected me to let you run around thinking that was fashionable?”

“It _was_ a fashion statement”, Raimundo said, leaning against one of the walls. “You can’t deny it.”

Remembering the pants and the many pockets, Clay couldn’t agree wholeheartedly. “Well, it was a statement of _some_ kind.”

“Yeah, a statement of poor taste”, the girl said, snorting. “And back to the topic you’re trying to derail, Rai; you’ve made Omi insecure.”

“Oh, come on”, the accused began. “Whatever I may have said, trust me he didn’t take it to heart. It’s Omi!”

He paused, shrugging.

“He’s probably just being a little shit with all this. I would if I were him.”

Shaking his head, Clay showed his disagreement. He’d known Omi for a long time now and this didn’t feel like something he would. Granted, he and the younger boy had a big brother-little brother relationship, which might have colored things in his eyes.

Raimundo, on the other hand, was positive because, well, he and Omi were more alike than he cared or wanted to admit. This was pure diabolical behavior, which the Water Dragon normally wouldn’t favor. When he was feeling petty or vindictive, though…

Though she didn’t know to which camp she belonged, Kimiko could definitely tell something fishy was going on. Clay had mentioned a phone call, but Omi told her Megan had been MIA recently and Jermaine was grounded with no phone use. He had no other friends, so who was he calling?

“Clay”, she began, finally asking. “Did you happen to know who Omi was talking to?”

The cowboy shook his head. “Nah, but I think it’s a mutual friend between him and Megan, though. Maybe someone she introduced him to when they were hanging out.”

“They don’t leave the temple, though”, Raimundo said, with a suspicious look. “Not once. When they’re hanging out, it means Megan is coming over or they’re, like, video-chatting, but they don’t go out.”

Kimiko gave Clay a worried look, which he soon reciprocated. He wished he could have heard more but sadly he hadn’t. The cowboy was about to talk when the three heard sounds of shuffling behind a column in the hallway.

Raimundo put a finger to his lips, silently ordering them to stay silent, to which both Dragons nodded. As they steadily moved to the column, Kimiko couldn’t believe they’d gotten so engrossed they didn’t notice a potential lurking threat.

Even though they’d gotten closer, the intruder was yet to move. Clay raised an eyebrow then gave his teammates a questioning look, which was answered by a go-ahead shrug.

The Earth Dragon reached his arms and grabbed the intruder from behind the column, almost instantly. When they finally saw who it was Clay had grabbed by the scruff on the neck, the teenagers were surprised.

“Omi”, Kimiko began, sighing. “How long have you been listening?”

The teenage boy shrugged, still in Clay’s grip, and gave a toothy grin. “Not much, I’ve just arrived, my friends.”

“Drop the cutesy ‘my friends’ act, little boy”, Raimundo said, crossing his arms again. “You’ve been here a while and we know it!”

When Omi didn’t answer, Clay, who had set him down a few seconds ago, took the lead.

“You’ve been here since the beginning, partner”, he asked. “Haven’t you?”

Omi shrugged, keeping a poker face. “Maybe so.”

The youngest of the group didn’t elaborate, so the silence stayed for a while. After an intense four-way stare-down, it was finally broken by Raimundo.

“Why?”

“Why what?”, Omi innocently asked.

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “Why do you mess up slang on purpose?”

Shrugging, the Water Dragon crossed his arms and didn’t answer. A moment later, he began to speak.

“I don’t know, why do you two”, he said, pointing at Kimiko and Raimundo. “Make fun of me when I do even though English isn’t your first language either? And why did you jump on the chance to mock me when I only got that _one_ saying wrong? So many questions, right?”

Clay started to intervene. “Omi—”

“No, no”, Raimundo said, gesturing Clay to stay out of this. “So, you’ve been doing this to teach us a _lesson_? That’s the point?”

“You could have talked to us”, Kimiko agreed. “We might’ve understood and—”

“Okay, first of all”, Omi said, cutting her off. “You singed his pants because you two had a clothing argument, so that wasn’t encouraging. Secondly, this was something I felt like I needed to do. Everyone has their thing around here, you know.”

He paused, closing his eyes as he realized he said too much.

“You know, like—like, Clay is this cowboy with all the intellectual layers, Raimundo’s trying to be the cool jock of all trades and _somehow_ it’s working, and you’re this ‘bad fucking bitch’, in your words. What do I have?”

Kimiko, hands already on her heart at the sentiment being expressed, cooed. “Aw, Omi. That was very sweet but you do know you’ve got a thing, though? You don’t have to make one up.”

“Yeah, partner”, Clay said, patting him on the back now. “You’re special in your own way.”

Omi raised an eyebrow. “That suspiciously sounds like an insult.”

“No, dude”, Raimundo said, trying to fix it. “He doesn’t mean it like that. He means you’ve got a thing like all of us.”

Omi considered the words, nodding slightly. He shrugged out of his friends’ grips and leaned on a wall across from the three of them.

“Fine”, he said. “Like what?”

At this, Kimiko turned to Clay, who immediately turned to Raimundo, who only shrugged.

“You know”, the latter said. “You’re the persistent annoying type.”

Kimiko gave her friend a look, before adding her take. “You can be sweet sometimes, when you’re not borrowing things without asking.”

“Partner”, Clay said, victoriously snapping his fingers. “I got it! You’re the precocious type.”

Hearing all of his friends’ statements, Omi only squinted. “Are you, are you saying I’m that annoying Matt kid from Lizzie McGuire?”

With an exaggerated sighed, Clay gave Kimiko the stink eye. “You just had to ‘educate’ him, didn’t you, Kimiko?”

“You’re not like Matt from Lizzie McGuire, Omi”, Kimiko said, ignoring the cowboy. This got a smile from the younger boy.

Unfortunately, it didn’t last very long.

“Yes actually”, Raimundo said, thoughtfully. “Now that you mention it, I really see it.”

“Rai”, Clay said, trying to verbally stop his friend, who gave him no mind.

“What?”, he said. “They’re one and the same. That Matt kid was an asshat!”

Omi gave Raimundo a look. “And you’re saying I’m like him?”

“What are you gonna do about it?”, the older boy said, giving his friend a look.

For a second, it seemed the words had gotten to Omi. Having already gotten into her stance, Kimiko prepared to stop the younger boy from going on an attack, while Clay prepared to do the same with the other one.

That didn’t happen, though. Instead of taking the opportunity to fight his friend, like he sometimes did when controlled emotion failed, Omi did the opposite. He laughed.

Clay exchanged a look with the other two, as they struggled to hold back their smiles. Omi’s laugh was surprisingly infectious, but at this time, it was nothing short of odd. He was laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes.

“Maybe I am”, Omi said, in between giggles. “Maybe I _am_ like that Matt kid. You guys fell for this slang thing for years. _Years_!”

The other three teenagers burst to laughs finally, with plenty to laugh about now.

They would, of course, argue about this the very next chance they got. Omi would stick his ground, Clay would take his side, and the other two would tell him he made too big of a deal of one little joke.

For now, though, they laughed.

On their way to their room, Omi whistled to himself, grabbing everyone attention.

“I guess the feline is out of the sack now, huh?”

Almost as automatically as a customer service message, Raimundo sighed and began his reply.

“It’s the cat’s out of—Omi, you’re a little shit!”


	2. Someone to Share A Flag With

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kimiko makes a very important discovery one day.

One month and twenty-one days after her sixteenth birthday, Kimiko had a realization. One that she felt extremely uncomfortable about and actually wished she could unrealize.

It was a Monday, around four-thirty, and she’d just realized she was not straight.

It wasn’t exactly a simple realization and she hadn’t been dwelling on it either.

All that happened was that she’d heard the news about the newest mermaid movie and started thinking back to the one mermaid she’d actually met. Dyris.

The mermaid—evil and something of an odd, definitely misogynistic cautionary tale now that she thought about it—was pretty. So pretty, she could have actually wrecked their temple apart.

Usually, the mermaid had an effect on those who were attracted to her, which made for an interesting few days.

Clay, who was gay but hadn’t come out yet, was affected but not because he felt anything for Dyris. It was actually a bit of a trap of his own making. He’d been trying so hard to make everyone think he was straight, he basically copied every one of Raimundo’s actions.

This led to something of an odd spell aftereffect and sort of, kinda, maybe got the cowboy bewitched, which he admitted years later with poignant embarrassment.

It was actually a little similar to what happened with Omi, who had been bewitched because of a sense of embedded chivalry to those in need. He didn’t exactly regret it later on, but he did think it was definitely the worst way to go.

Raimundo was another story. That boy had been two hairbreadths away from going absolutely off the rails. It was actually a little annoying, since all he’d said then was ‘_Dyris this_’ and ‘_Dyris that_’.

Sadly, it was also similar to the way he behaved when he fixated on something, so differentiating between the normal and bewitched states was hard.

It all came down to her in the end, to figure it all out and save them.

After everything went down and the Dragons went to bed, Raimundo whispered that they were extremely lucky Kimiko wasn’t a lesbian because then they would have been truly fucked.

Clay had scoffed then, she remembered, and even Omi gave a small smile. None of the boys realized that she’d felt something too, which was a relief.

Yes, Kimiko _did_ feel something for that mermaid too. The only reason she wasn’t in the same messy state everyone was in was sheer stubbornness. Honestly.

From what she recalled, she saw Dyris and felt something of a connection, which made sense to her since she’d been away from other girls for a long time.

When it started feeling weird, though—with butterflies and the finding every excuse to visit her and whatnot—that was when Kimiko stubbornly shelved the whole idea aside because this was definitely not happening. Not now.

In the end, that was what eventually saved them all. Right now, it was what caused her delayed realization. She liked girls too.

It wasn’t exactly the first time she’d felt a strange gut feeling around a girl.

Before, there was Rin in grade-school and then Kimela and also Fae from her international school. Not to mention, of course, the famous incident when she accidentally ran into a not-yet all-that-known Sofia Jamora a few years ago and lost all power of speech.

At first, she thought it might have been an odd sort of jealousy. Maybe they were better or prettier or smarter, so maybe that was why she was on edge. If it wasn’t, then all the irrational anger she’d occasionally felt in those situations definitely came out of nowhere.

Now, though, she realized the anger came from holding back herself and trying to pretend she was like every other straight girl, which eventually led her to this point, where she couldn’t turn a blind eye anymore.

This might have been an easier realization to have if she went with her gut when the idea first came about. Delaying it just made things worse because now she really didn’t know what to do.

It wasn’t like she didn’t have a plethora of coming out ways she could pick and choose from. The boys did all the work, in regard to that.

Two years earlier during one of their days off, Clay sat them all down and used an hour-long PowerPoint presentation to tell them he was gay. It was a highly informative, surprisingly historical experience but that made Clay comfortable so they just went with it, no joking around whatsoever.

A few months before that, Raimundo came out by being extremely flirty with a local at a town they were Wu-hunting in. Kimiko vaguely recalled she said that was a bit gay of him, to which he replied with a confident ‘_I know_’ and that was that.

Interestingly, Omi never said he was gay to them. One day, not even a particular day they all remembered, he told them he thought one actor was cute and was surprised to see their reactions. He’d kind of considered it a given. What was the big deal, right?

What’s the big deal, Kimiko thought, repeating it in her head. Sure, it might have not been a big deal for him, but it was turning into that for her.

She’d delayed it, partially, because she didn’t want the headache some family members and friends would bring. Not that the delay helped her any. See, delaying the discovery to herself meant she was going on dates with guys and the thing is she really liked them, too.

“So fucking what, Kimiko?”, she could almost hear Raimundo very tiredly say. “Bi people exist. Don’t erase us from your narrative.”

It was a big deal, though. No matter which angle she tried to take it from, it remained the same.

Was she just straight and conning herself? But sometimes she went for long periods of time without feeling anything for a boy. So, was she a lesbian and again, conning herself? Would others think the same thoughts she was currently having? _God_, would they think she was being an attention-seeker?

Realizing her brain was going way too fast for herself to comprehend, Kimiko took a deep breath and turned to what she always turned to for anything in life. The internet.

Evidently, that was the worst thing to do. Twitter threads were bad enough and Reddit was worse.

Maybe she did need human help after all.

* * *

Walking away from her isolated point at the koi pond, Kimiko knew that she had to turn to the one bisexual person she actually knew. Not that she wanted to.

Yes, she and Raimundo were good friends, but that didn’t mean she liked asking for help. If anything, Kimiko was the person who people turned to for advice. The fact that she was asking now—well, it wasn’t a good feeling.

Since it was a day off, she knew she would find him in their room. It didn’t take a psychic to know that if there was nothing to do, Raimundo will not leave his bed.

And sure enough, he was there, listening to some obscure track he would probably start blabbing about if she didn’t stop.

With a practice eye-roll, Kimiko raised a hand to stop him before he started.

“That’s rude, Hottie”, Raimundo said, flopping back down with much less enthusiasm. “This is a really nice song.”

Kimiko scoffed. “You know I don’t like Brazilian funk and I never will.”

“Fine”, he said, a bit stubbornly. “I will never listen to any of your recommendations then and—you want something?”

As he said that last bit, Raimundo sat up again, concerned. Kimiko had been opening and closing her mouth like she wanted to say something but kept backtracking at the last minute like a sad impression of a guppy. 

“Well”, Kimiko said, finally finding her voice. “I wanted to ask you how you found out you were bi.”

Raimundo raised an eyebrow. “I told you like a million times, though.”

“One more couldn’t hurt”, she said, giving him a faint glare.

“Okay”, he said, shrugging. “I found myself having a crush on this girl and then I saw her brother and I was a little interested, but I couldn’t tell why.”

“And how did you tell?”

“I was getting there. Anyway, I had a conversation with a friend of mine and he was, like, you know some people are bi, right? So, I was like _oh_, that makes sense and—”

Kimiko interrupted again, disbelief coloring her voice. “That’s it? What, you had no doubts? Nothing?”

“No, I had plenty of doubts, but you know how it is”, Raimundo said, though the girl looked pretty much lost. “I have a feeling you’ve got something on your mind.”

Kimiko held back her tongue from swearing. “Yeah, kinda. I think I’m, I’m—you know.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Well, I’m not sure so I can’t really say it.”

“And I’m not psychic, so I can’t know if you don’t tell me.”

“Fine”, Kimiko said, sighing. “I think I might be like you, you know.”

“That can be a lot of things”, Raimundo said, scratching his chin. “Funny? Smart? The hottest person in every room? What?”

“No”, she said with an eye-roll. “I think I’m bi.”

Now that she’d actually said it out loud, Kimiko felt extremely conflicted. There was a sort of happiness at being this relieved and finally getting it off her chest, but it was mixed with a sense of terrified anticipation.

The smile on Raimundo’s face couldn’t get any bigger, though.

“Girl!”, he said, leaping onto his feet and immediately hugging her. “Welcome to the club! You know what they say, everybody loves you when you’re bi.”

Kimiko broke the hug first, uncertainty clear on her face. “Do they?”

“Do you want the truth or a really good lie?”, Raimundo said, sitting back down. “I can give you either.”

Sitting down too, she found it hard to make her voice audible. “The truth.”

“Okay then”, he said. “No, people really don’t love it when you’re bi—they think you don’t know what you want or, or that you’re selfish, or that you're either straight or gay and just denying yourself. One dude actually said that last thing to me, you know. He said that bisexuality is just a 'stepping stone' to saying you're gay. Can you believe that?"

Kimiko avoided his eyes. "That's a horrible thing to know people think."

"It is", Raimundo agreed, nonchalantly. "You know, some people actually think people say they're bi because they’re just in love with attention.”

He paused, raising a hand.

“Not that you can’t be bi _and_ an attention whore—like you can, but it’s not because of your sexuality.”

Kimiko bit the inside of her cheek. “I'm not trying to be crass, but do you ever think that you’re wrong, though? Like, maybe you played yourself and you _are_ actually straight but—”

“Do _not_ begin with that shit”, Raimundo said, rubbing his temples. “That’s a thought that's always in my head and everyone else's too.”

“Yeah”, she said, nodding. “The straight people are going to say you’re just having a phase.”

“And the gay people too, actually”, he said, smiling sheepishly. “Not all of them obviously, but some think you’re less gay if you’re not dating a guy, in my case.”

Kimiko furrowed her eyebrows. “And in that case _who_ do you turn to?”

“Other bi people, of course”, Raimundo said. “Anytime you want to bitch about guys and girls or the invalidation and biphobia we’ll be facing for quite a big portion of our lives—well, you know where I live.”

Giggling a little, she punched him on the shoulder to ease the awkwardness she was still feeling. “Yeah. How do you think I should tell them?”

“Who, your family?”

“_What_? No, of course I’m not going to tell them now! I meant Clay and Omi and the others.”

“Oh, that.”

“Yeah, that.”

After a lengthy pause, Kimiko gave Raimundo a look. She was still worried and a little terrified out of her mind, but right now she smiled. She had at least one person in her corner and that meant a lot right now.

“Tell you what”, Raimundo said, breaking the silence with a clap. “Let’s think about that later. We need to get you the cool bi haircut.”

Kimiko scoffed, gesturing at his head. “You don’t have that.”

“Girl, what are you talking about? I just had my hair done”, he said, passing his fingers over his cornrows.

Laughing at her friend’s act, Kimiko felt something of a relief before the worries came to haunt her again.

“I’m still a little anxious, Rai”, she said. “I mean, I’ve never been with a girl before, how can I even be sure?”

Raimundo made a vague gesture. “Like this? You said you’re bi so you’re bi. You don’t have to have a checklist of experience or even like everyone the same.”

“But, it’s just—”

“Kim, say it with me _sou bi_, _e daí_.”

“I’m guessing _e daí_ means so what”, she said, bemusedly. “I see your point, but it’s just…”

“Look, I know how you feel”, he said, sympathetically. “I still feel like that from time to time and sometimes, I start to even believe it. Come on, just say it.”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “Fine, _sou bi, e daí_.”

“See how easy that was?”, Raimundo said, encouragingly nodding. “Do it again with feeling.”

“I’m not going to yell in this room and attract attention to myself, dude, come on.”

“Fair enough.”

* * *

After finishing a lengthy, boring conversation with Master Wong, Clay was on his way to the bedroom for a nap. He was sure he wasn’t going to miss much. Usually when a day started this slow at their temple, it ended on the very same note.

As he reached his destination, however, the cowboy saw a weird sight. Omi was pressing himself against the wall, right next to the hole where the door would have been.

It seemed as if the boy was—

“Eavesdropping, Omi?”, Clay said, unintentionally slipping into a whisper.

Having probably sensed his presence, the younger boy didn’t even flinch. However, he did give him a pleading look with a finger pressed to his lips.

“I have given way too much energy to back up now, Clay”, Omi whispered. “They’re talking about something important and I need to find out what it is.”

Clay scratched his ear, a little apprehensively. He couldn’t deny that he was curious about what was going on in there and why it’s gotten Omi that intrigued, but at the same time, he didn’t like listening in on people.

“You’re still eavesdropping, partner.”

“Just this once, can’t I?”

“Well, um, I think if—what are they talking about then?”

“See! You’re curious too”, Omi whispered, triumphantly. “Just shut up and we’ll find out.”

So, Clay did keep his quiet and hid beside his friend, straining his ears to hear what was being said inside.

Usually, when Kimiko and Raimundo whispered together alone, a prank was on its way or a juicy secret about a temple-resident was being told. Either way, they had to find out.

The voices sounded a lot more serious than they’d be, Clay thought, raising an eyebrow. Omi must have noticed too because he was giving him a concerned look now.

“Girl!”, they heard before Raimundo went back to whispering. “Welcome to the club! You know what they say, everybody loves you when you’re bi.”

At that Clay and Omi whipped their heads to share a surprised look. They hadn’t expected that, if they were being honest. In their shock, they’d almost missed Kimiko’s question.

“—they?”

“—the truth or a really good lie”, they managed to hear now. “I can give you either.”

Kimiko then said she’d like the truth and Raimundo’s reply came in whispers, which they couldn’t really comprehend.

Later on, when they’d go to piece it together, Clay would say he’d definitely heard ‘_don’t know what you want_’ and selfish. Omi would add that he definitely made out words like ‘_attention whore_’ and ‘_played yourself_’.

Either way, that wasn’t their point now. Clay tugged on Omi’s arm soon after and gestured him to follow him outside. They needed to talk.

“Obviously, we accept her”, Omi began the minute they sat down in the rock garden. “She’s our friend and we love her, so of course, we accept her.”

Clay nodded. “I know that, partner, but it’s just—ugh, never mind.”

“No”, Omi said, turning a curious eye to Clay. “Tell me what you think?”

Huffing a little but not knowing how to get out of it, the cowboy relented. “Don’t you think it’s weird Kim didn’t go to all of us when she wanted to come out? Like, all of us-all of us.”

“Not really”, the younger boy said, shrugging. “If she’s bisexual, then it would make sense for her to seek out someone who is bisexual. Nothing strange there.”

“So, you don’t think she may be scared of telling us?”

“Scared and Kimiko in the same sentence? No, of course not.”

Pausing a little, the youngest of the Dragons continued.

“Why would you even think she’d be scared of telling us? We’re both gay.”

“Yeah but”, Clay began, pausing a little to gather his words. “But it’s different for bi people because sometimes, even gay people think they’re not genuine.”

Omi scoffed. “People do that? That’s horrible.”

“I know, partner, but maybe Kimiko thought we might fall into that category.”

“Well obviously, we have to go to her and tell her we’re not biphobic gay people and that we accept her and love her very much, Clay!”

“No, no, no”, Clay said, stopping the boy in his tracks. “We will not be doing that! This is a sensitive topic, Omi, we have to wait for her to tell us.”

Omi frowned. “I don’t understand. What if she doesn’t tell us for a long time? A month or even a year? Then what?”

“Then we just deal with it”, Clay said, shrugging. “If she doesn’t want to tell us, we can’t hassle her into it.”

Sighing, Omi turned around and crossed his arms. Rummaging the thought in his head, the boy nodded and sat back down next to Clay. It wasn’t easy for him to admit defeat, but when it happened, he knew it.

Still, something was very much bothering him, gnawing at his chest like a petty wildcat.

“Clay?”

“Yes, Omi?”

“Do you think there’s a possibility she might never tell us?”

“No, of course not. Kimiko trusts us; she just needs time.”

Now that the thought made its way to Clay’s memory-bank though, he was a little terrified of the whole possibility. Kimiko wouldn’t do that, would she?

* * *

The next morning was like the same as any other in the temple. By 5:00 AM, everyone was up and at the breakfast table. Well, almost everyone.

“Where’s Kim?”, Clay asked, raising an eyebrow. He’d been positive he’d seen her whizzing by as he got ready for the day.

Taking a sip of his coffee, Raimundo made a gesture. “She’s calling Keiko—actually, I think she’s _still_ in a call with her.”

“Isn’t now a little early in Japan”, Omi said, matter-of-factly. “Shouldn’t Keiko be sleeping?”

Sharing a look, Clay and Raimundo answered at the same time. “She should.”

As breakfast progressed and Kimiko remained a no-show, Omi began to get a little anxious.

Sure, he’d been a little worried about the possibility of her never coming out to them, but he’d never realized that meant she might avoid them altogether too.

He didn’t just appreciate her as a teammate—which he did, truly—but also as a friend and a good one too.

Clay seemed to be having the same thoughts too because he kept looking at the door like the girl might pop in with a laugh and a funny story at any second.

The only one who wasn’t greatly affected by the unappearance was Raimundo, who looked like he wanted to tell them something.

“Alright, dudes”, he said, snapping his fingers to capture their attentions. “So, Kimiko told me to tell you she’s bi.”

Clay and Omi shared a look of mixed relief, though their smiles fell down soon after.

“She told you to do this?”, Clay asked, a little uncertainly. "Really?"

Raimundo shrugged. “She actually demanded, but yeah. This is not the point.”

“Isn’t it, though?”, Omi said, skeptically.

“No. Look, guys, she’s worried, like a lot—you know when she worries and it’s like poking a jaguar with a short stick.”

Omi raised an eyebrow. “It’s like what?”

“It makes more sense in Portuguese”, Raimundo said, waving him off. “Anyway, we need to cheer her up and I know just how we’re doing that.”

Clay was intrigued, though cautious. “We can’t leave the temple or do anything too outrageous, just letting you know.”

“We’re not. It’s actually a very simple plan. So—”

* * *

Kimiko wasn’t having the best of days, not that this was a shocking piece of news.

Her entire week hadn’t been going that well, really. She started it with a long, berating phone call from her father about her grades which recently a dive down.

Then, she suffered a blocked nose for about two days. This was, of course, followed by an intense self-discovery that led to a semi-nervous breakdown and now here she was. Getting the temple groceries alone.

Usually, it wasn’t a one-person task because of all the bags, but today none of the boys wanted to come with her. It was supposed to be Clay’s turn, but he said he was a little under the weather and faked the worst fake-cough she’d ever seen in her life.

It could be that he was uncomfortable around her now, she thought. That was always a lovely likelihood, made possible by her delegating her coming out to them to Raimundo.

Maybe the boys—yes, both boys because Omi was definitely avoiding her too—were a little perturbed by the news, which would have been strange, considering she wasn’t the only bisexual person in the temple.

Maybe, and this was a hopefully more realistic possibility, they were hurt she didn’t tell them herself. But then again, were they even entitled to that?

After all, this was hers, all hers. These feelings of nervousness and fear and relief and joy and constant anxiety were hers. No, they didn’t know how it felt to be in her position.

If there was a little similarity, it was still different because they were different people and things didn’t affect them in the same way.

It has been about two days now and she was still as nervous as ever. Nervous, but more well-read, she supposed. Searching online, Kimiko felt more comfortable.

She found interviews of authors and regular people and celebrities talking about bisexuality and their own feelings. She found books, fiction and nonfiction, and found essays upon essays of other bi people, reaching out and giving their own advice.

All of this made Kimiko feel better, much lighter, though the anxiety lingered. It probably would until she came out to her father and the rest of her family. Maybe even after.

Right now, she had other things to worry about. Namely, sitting down two Xiaolin Dragons to tell it to them how it is.

Once in the temple, Kimiko gathered what remained of her strength and sprinted to the kitchen.

The plastic bags were actually beginning to cut circulation to her arms, so the relief she felt once she dropped the bags on the kitchen table was extraordinary.

Right at the moment where Kimiko began massaging her wrists and silently sending a thankful prayer to the heavens, a strange ruckus happened.

She was positive she heard little movements in the shadows, loudly enhanced by a loud hit to something blocky. Sighing tiredly, the girl rolled her shoulders before taking a fighting stance.

“Whoever you are”, Kimiko began. “You’re in bad luck today because I’m an extremely shitty mood. You do _not_ want to try me!”

“Thank God we don’t, then”, Raimundo said, quite literally coming out of nowhere.

Before she could register her confusion, a chorus of ‘_surprise_’s and ‘_congrats_’ filled the room, as did the presences of Omi and Clay, both smiling with the latter holding a cake.

“The fuck?”, Kimiko said, before taking a double-take at everything.

It was a bit ridiculous she hadn’t noticed, if she was being honest. The kitchen had some decorations and the like, but in her haste, she didn’t catch them.

She took another look at the cake in Clay’s hands and realization made her shock turn to embarrassed laughter. It was all _for her_.

The cake in his hands looked like regular chocolate cake, but the frosting was interesting. It was purple, pink, and blue and seeing it was like a hug after a long day.

Also purple and pink and blue was the flag Raimundo was holding with both hands, which he later draped around her shoulders like a cape. Omi not wanting to be left out of the party, had stuck in a few candles—all different shapes and sizes because they were leftovers from other occasions—and lit them up.

All the while, the three boys were singing a song she didn’t catch. She was little bit of a mess at that point, but she was glad she put on waterproof mascara.

“This is the nicest thing”, Kimiko began, wiping her eyes, embarrassed at her own reaction. “I’m just—you guys made a cake and everything.”

“Obviously, Kimiko”, Clay said, shrugging. “We’ve noticed you were, uh, quite anxious and all these past couple of days and Rai here told us your news, so we just wanted to say that—”

Omi cut in, impatiently. “We’ll accept you no matter what. We’re family, Kimiko.”

“Could’ve waited”, the cowboy said, begrudgingly. “But little fella’s right, Kim.”

Instead of being rendered speechless, like she honestly thought she might be, Kimiko found herself smiling and speaking before she could fully comprehend what she was saying.

“I’ve got the best friends anyone can ask for, I really do”, she said, opening her arms. “This is going to be the only time I’ll ever ask for a group hug. _Use_ it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have nothing to say here, but I always imagine like this would be kind of cute


	3. Master Fung Gives A Long-Awaited Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean like it definitely happened.

“Kill me”, Raimundo said, shutting his eyes. “If you’re here, _Deus_, _por favor me mate_.”

To his right, a two-shades whiter Clay cleared his throat. “This must be a dream of some sort—like a, like a group hallucination.”

“Kimiko”, Omi asked, giving his friend a pleading look. “Do group hallucinations actually happen?”

Keeping a poker face on, the girl shrugged. “I really hope they do. Trust me.”

Sighing, Master Fung tried to not make his eye-roll too noticeable. These were the warriors an entire generation would be defended by. Well, heavens help that generation because now the Dragons were whining like a bunch of babies.

For what it’s worth, Master Fung wasn’t having the time of his life either. He hadn’t wanted to give that talk but it was neigh time he did. He wasn’t going to let the possibility of anything whatsoever happen without his students knowing how to face it.

This is why this needed to be done.

“So”, Master Fung began, as awkwardly as a human had ever spoken. “What do you know about sex?”

As the students all groaned and hid their faces in embarrassment and awkwardness, Master Fung shut his eyes too. How did his day go from completely normal to this, you may ask?

Well, if there was anything Master Fung Wen has ever regretted doing, it was definitely turning on the TV that morning.

It was what eventually led him here, to this room, sitting in front of the temple’s teenage warriors and trying to be serious. He should have let it go really. Right now, all he wished was that he could somehow undo all of this.

Yes, he’d definitely go back and undo it if they’d had the Sands of Time, but they didn’t so he couldn’t and he had to deal with the consequences.

It’d been nothing out of ordinary, really. The day had started when Master Fung woke up at 4 AM, the hour he usually woke up at to have any time of peace and quiet before everyone else woke up too.

Sometimes, Master Fung actually wished he could let them sleep till noon, like Raimundo constantly pleaded, but a lesson was a lesson and he was a teacher. So, he’d wait.

That day, Master Fung made himself some tea and had some biscuits and noticed that, well, he’d been pretty bored.

He wanted something to diffuse the air so he decided to turn on the small TV they’d recently installed in the kitchen. Somehow, he remembered, scoffing, the Dragons had ganged up on him and made him buy them a TV.

The temple had to join the 21st century sometime, they’d stressed. Although Master Fung had told them they had a perfectly good washing machine, a landline, and electricity, they couldn’t have cared less.

The kids wanted their TV and they weren’t shutting up until they got it, so Master Fung relented. Now, he at least had to see what the temple paid for.

Taking a sip of his tea, Master Fung noticed that the last channel the TV had been set on was some knockoff, copyright hazard of MTV. Not only that, it was also playing some of the channel’s old shows.

This is all a long way of saying that, yes, Master Fung had seen exactly one episode of Teen Mom.

As the show ended, Master Fung couldn’t really help himself.

He chuckled, a little nervously, at what he’d just seen. That show was more than a few years ago—it was technically around ten years ago, so the teenagers of now and then had definitely changed.

But how much had they changed, the old man thought. Unfortunately, this thought inspired him to turn to the internet, where his searching led him to quite a few news sites that kind of had him in a perpetual state of panic.

So many teenagers, Master Fung saw, had been treated horrifically. They’d been part of crimes and they’d been beaten up—even murdered!

Seeing that, the old teacher was grateful the Dragons knew how to defend themselves, at least.

But then, he realized that they knew how to defend themselves against physical altercations and situations. Other situations—like the ones relating to sex—were still a gray area and no matter how well-versed they were in today’s world, they did still grow up semi-removed from a lot of things in the temple.

Master Fung had to change this. He’d definitely have to put a stop to this, but he didn’t know how or where to begin.

* * *

As the day progressed, Master Fung came to a decision. He would keep an extra close eye on his students and would only gather them to have that talk if they needed to. And then, they’ll all move on.

At the start of the day, Master Fung hadn’t really found a reason. He’d had Dojo keep his eye on them as they woke up and had their breakfast.

“So that was the most fruitless morning I ever spent”, Dojo reported to him as the kids did their morning warm-ups. “And this is coming from someone who tried to sway the Japanese emperor from his path in the 30’s.”

Master Fung nodded. “Boring is good news when it comes to teenagers, Dojo. I should know.”

“Huh, I guess that’s right”, the dragon said, wrapping himself around the man’s shoulder. “I always forget you were a high school teacher before.”

The old man was right, of course, boring was great when it came to teenagers and boring was all they ever got lately. The Dragons were allowed to mingle with outsiders, despite Master Yang’s several protests, and they usually did on their missions or trips to town.

Lately, though, that took a dip downwards. So yes, Master Fung had nothing to worry about for now. Maybe he could even postpone the—

“Ow!”

That pained sound made Master Fung make the mistake of taking his eyes off the familiar bickering between Masters Huang and Luo to notice something odd happening between the Dragons in their training.

From the three boys crowding the courtyard, Master Fung gathered that Kimiko had fallen. Perhaps she’d tried a certain move and sprained her ankle. Either way, she was hurt, pained hissing sounds were reaching Master Fung all the way to where he stood.

As he walked to his students, Master Fung nodded at the cooperation he was seeing. He always loved seeing his students helping each other and—just what was he doing?

“Clay!”, the old teacher exclaimed, walking faster. “What exactly are you doing?”

Said teenager stood up, dropping the foot he’d been holding. “I was rubbing her ankle, sir? I’d heard that was what you should do when an ankle sprains, y’know, to ease the pain.”

“Oh”, Master Fung said, calming down now. “That’s fine, then. Don’t move, Kimiko, I’ll get the Rio Reverso.”

No, thank God, it wasn’t what he’d been thinking, but then again—well, no, it couldn’t. The old teacher had definitely heard the cowboy said he was strictly interested in young men before.

This paranoia wasn’t going to help anyone, Master Fung could see. He had to do his part.

“Rio Reverso”, he said, activating the Wu on Kimiko’s ankle. “Warriors, there will be no training today.”

“Really?”, Raimundo asked, trying to unsuccessfully hide his glee while Omi disapprovingly clicked his tongue. “Is something happening Master Fung?”

“Yes, Raimundo”, the teacher said. “We’re having a discussion today.”

Kimiko shook her head. “Hold up, I didn’t study for any Xiaolin pop quiz.”

“It’s not a quiz, young monk”, Master Fung said. “Meet me in the meditation hall in fifteen minutes.”

Of course, the fifteen minutes were more for Master Fung to prepare himself than anything else. He was more or less a nervous wreck and that wasn’t helped by the fact that he was now half-certain that he was making a situation out of nothing.

“Sup, Master Fung”, Raimundo said, entering the hall with a bag of chips. “As you see I’m here early.”

The old man nodded. “I see that. It’s a first.”

“I’m hoping it counts in the long run”, the boy said, nodding. “So if I’m ever late when I’m out, I’ll be excused.”

“Take a seat, young one”, Master Fung said, silently greeting his other students as they walked in with their snacks and drinks. Somehow, a ‘_discussion_’ in their minds was now associated with projector presentations.

“We’re all here”, Kimiko said, blowing a bubblegum. “So, what’s up?”

Master Fung squared his shoulders. He wished Dojo would be here to offer moral support at least but the old dragon bailed, naturally.

“We’re going to have a much-needed talk. Can you guess about what?”

Clay raised a hand. “Can it be about Raimundo using up all the hot water?”

“Who knows”, the accused said, shrugging. “Maybe it’s about Omi’s new annoying alarm clock. It literally wakes up the entire temple.”

Kimiko offered her take, because of course. “I guess it’s about the extra snacks we’ve been getting but to be fair, we’re all growing young people.”

“Guys, guys”, Omi said, scanning them with a look. “This could be about something serious. Master Fung might have discovered a new scheme the Heylin are planning.”

“Nothing of that sort, Omi”, Master Fung said, sighing. This introduction was taking way too long. “We’re going to talk about sex.”

From the silence that followed, the old teacher thought he might have not been heard properly. A second later, though, the sputtering followed and so did the yells and shocked expressions.

“Master Fung, with all due respect”, Kimiko began, indicating that she might become very disrespectful. “I don’t think we really need to talk about sex. It’s literally the last thing we need to talk about.”

Raimundo took this as an opportune moment to step in. “I think what she means is we don’t need that talk because, well, it’s a little late for that.”

“Meaning?”, Master Fung asked, crossing his arms.

“Meaning”, Raimundo repeated. “The only virgin in this room is Omi.”

He paused, taking a look at Master Fung’s robes before continuing.

“I’m assuming, I mean.”

Nodding, Master Fung feigned being impressed. “Very well, can you tell us what you know about sex, Raimundo?”

“Tell you?”, the boy asked, nervously. “You mean, like…the first time or…?”

Omi made a face. “I’d rather not hear that.”

“And I’d rather not share”, Clay said, grimacing. “We don’t have to share, right, Master Fung?”

Said teacher nodded. “That wasn’t my intention, Clay. All I’m asking for is facts that Raimundo claims to know so much about, though from who, I do not know.”

“We did have a Sex Ed teacher at the circus, you know”, Raimundo explained, a little defensively. “Cleo, the lion-tamer.”

Kimiko snorted. “This should be educational!”

“Anyway”, Raimundo continued, in an acidic tone. “She was good. Informational and all.”

“You’re stalling”, Master Fung commented, sighing. “What do you know? It’s a clear question.”

The boy huffed, waving his hand in a vague gesture.

“Okay, I can’t say I know _everything_, but I know the important parts”, he said. “Like, the STDs and their symptoms. And Pregnancy—like, duh, on that one!”

He paused, pretending not to hear the snickering of his teammates, which got louder by the minute.

"This is amazing", Omi said, pretending to wipe a tear. "I didn't know a person can not know so much about _everything_."

“Contraceptives too”, Raimundo said, shooting the youngest Dragon a dirty look. “Cleo taught us a lot about contraceptives.”

Trying his best to nod so they can move past this exchange, Master Fung opened his mouth to speak only to be interrupted by the Wind Dragon, who had taken a minute to think.

“Cleo did say if you’re short on contraceptives, though, you can just pu—”

“Yeah, I take it back”, Kimiko said, wincing. “Some of us might need this talk.”

Try as she might, though, Kimiko couldn’t get the old teacher to narrow down the lesson plan to just Omi and Raimundo. Settling, resigned to their fates, Kimiko and Clay had to join the talk too.

Omi wasn’t appreciating the fact that he was assumed to know nothing, though.

“I’m fourteen, you know!”, he’d said, beginning a tirade that would end fifteen minutes later. “Which means I know things! Like, things _you_ know too. Also, the internet is a thing!”

Although he didn’t admit this, Master Fung had tuned out Omi himself. Right now, he was regretting he hadn’t delegated this to Dojo.

The dragon knew how to attract the kids’ attention. It wasn’t that Master Fung couldn’t take a book out of Dojo’s book; he just didn’t want to. That would be a cheap shot. Right now, he couldn’t care less, though.

“We’re having an oral quiz”, Master Fung said, eyes shut though he could still hear the childish giggling.

Pausing, the old man sighed. He was too old for this.

“Fine, a _written_ quiz”, the old man said, amending himself. “After we’re done with this talk and whoever gets the highest grade will have a chore free week.”

Clay raised an eyebrow. “Lick that calf again? You serious, Master Fung?”

“Yes, young monk.”

“How high is the highest point, though?”, Kimiko asked, suspiciously. “You could just start playing favorites.”

Master Fung shot her a look. “I won’t.”

“It’s game time”, Raimundo said, grinning at his teammates. “All you bitches are going down!” 

* * *

“I can’t believe this”, the Wind Dragon grumbled as he trudged out of the meditation hall. “I got the _lowest_ points? Seriously?”

Clay chuckled. “And you started out doing so well for yourself too. What a shame!”

“Shut up, Buster Brown”, Raimundo retorted. “You didn’t win it either.”

Kimiko snorted. “I can’t believe what made me lose was a question about ‘nocturnal emissions’. Like, Jesus fuck, what even?”

“You do know nocturnal emissions are just wet dreams, right, Kim?”, Clay said. “Ain’t no hill for a stepper.”

The girl snorted. “I know that now. He should have just said that.”

“I can’t imagine it coming out of his mouth”, Raimundo said, laughing. “But yeah, you’re still a fucking loser for not knowing!”

Kimiko smiled at him sweetly. “Remind me what made you drop that many points again, Rai? A question about chlamydia, was it?”

“It’s not my fault Cleo left before she could get into details about that”, Raimundo said, a little peeved at the repetitive topic.

“Yeah, I didn’t understand what you said the first time”, Clay said, squinting. “Your part-time teacher, part-time lion-tamer got manhandled by the police or something?”

“Arrested. She was arrested, Clay.”

“What for?”

“…Drug-trafficking, but that’s beside the point.”

“Who’s selling drugs?”, Omi chirped as he exited the hall with a big smile on his face. “Kimiko, are you finally going down that reality TV star route?”

Rolling her eyes, the girl simply blew a raspberry and ignored Omi’s question. The youngest Dragon wasn’t pissed off, though. He had after all—

“I won the challenge”, he gloated, reminding the others of his victory. “Me? The one you all thought was going to lose, well ha-ha!”

He paused, grinning like he'd won the lottery. “That was me having the last laugh, by the way.”

Clay sighed. “We got that Omi.”

“Just Omi?”

“You gotta special name in mind, little fella?”

“I don’t know”, the boy said. “How about Sexpert Omi?”

Raimundo pointed a finger. “No.”

“It’s creepy, dude”, Kimiko agreed. “And you only won because you’re Master Fung’s favorite.”

Omi gasped. “And what if I am? Our teacher isn’t biased and I’m _shocked_ you would suggest that, Kimiko.”

“Oh fuck off”, she said, rolling her eyes. “Remember the time you—”

The teenagers walked away as they argued, the sounds of their admittedly-loud conversation fainting as they faded out of earshot. Engrossed in their bickering, they hadn’t noticed that Master Fung had just left the hall too.

As he watched his students, Master Fung smiled, contently. That was a nerve-wracking afternoon, sure, but it was an afternoon well-spent. At least he could sleep knowing he delved into every topic that he could.

A green dragon floated into his view. “The kids are yelling about chlamydia in the hallway, so I take it you talked to them?”

“Interestingly without any of your help, Dojo”, Master Fung said, letting some sarcasm slip into his tone. “Where were you?”

Dojo scoffed. “Away, where I said you won’t find me because I was not getting involved with all that awkwardness.”

He paused, side-eyeing the monk.

“How did it go by the way?”

Master Fung shrugged. “Kimiko misunderstood nocturnal emissions, Clay didn’t quite grasp birth control effectiveness at first, and Raimundo didn’t know what chlamydia does to the reproductive system.”

“And Omi?”, Dojo asked. “You must have had a million questions with that one!”

The man shrugged. “Actually, Omi aced the quiz.”

“You, you quizzed them, Wen? I thought you were going to talk?”

“I was, but then I decided that quizzes would make the information stick around longer.”

Dojo floated for a while before taking his perch on Master Fung’s shoulder. He hummed a little content tune, as he stretched his claws.

“We’ll see.”

The old teacher agreed. “We’ll see.”

After a long pause, momentarily disturbed by the sounds of passing monks, Master Fung remembered an interesting accusation he’d heard. Side-eying Dojo on his shoulder, the old man asked.

“Dojo, I don’t play favorites with the students, do I?”

“Well…”

“Well what?”

Dojo gave him a sheepish smile. “At least, you try not to be obvious about it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like being responsible for four teenagers takes a toll on an old monk, but he does it so calmly he must have deal with teenagers before. So, that's my take.


	4. Bits and Pieces of Odd Conversations At the Xiaolin Temple

“Fuck you”, Kimiko said, sniffling. “Fuck you, Raimundo.”

Although she’d said it twice, this wasn’t the only time she’d cursed her friend. In fact, she had been doing nothing else for the better part of the last hour.

Raimundo sneezed and blew his nose. “I don’t understand how it’s my fault you’re sick, girl.”

“Because”, Kimiko said, annoyed at her blocked-nose voice. “You sneezed in my direction, remember? That’s why I got sick. You’re evil.”

He scoffed, coughing immediately after. “So now I’m evil?”

“You knew I had a date today, you just did!”

“Jesus”, Raimundo said, holding his ears. “Too loud.”

Kimiko kept staring. “You owe me big time. She was hot and she only had this weekend in China.”

“And?”, he said. “You weren’t gonna make it a thing anyway, if anything I saved you from heartbreak. You owe _me_.”

Barely leaning over from the duo’s pile of tissues, the girl flicked her friend in the ear. She leaned back to her pillows and sighed.

“This is boring.”

Raimundo shrugged. “We’re sick, dude, what can we do?”

At that moment, Izumi the cook peeked her head through the doorway, taking her usual lookover of the kids. Muttering under her breath, the cook went on her merry way.

“What do you think she’s saying?”, Raimundo asked, curiously.

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “I can’t hear that far but she’s probably bitching about us sitting way too close or something. It’s Izumi, you know.”

Chuckling, the boy kept his eyes on the doorway as if trying to recall something. As soon as he did, Raimundo snapped his fingers and drew Kimiko’s attention.

“Dude, I can’t believe I forgot to tell you”, he whispered. “But Izumi’s having an affair.”

Kimiko’s jaw dropped. “Shut up!”

“I’m serious! I heard her on the phone and everything. She was being very flirty and I know my Japanese isn’t great but from what you taught me, it’s definitely something flirty.”

“She was talking in Japanese?”, the girl asked. “Do you think she was talking to that mysterious husband of hers? The one we’re not sure she’s legally married to?”

The leader gave her a look. “Actually, I think it’s deeper than that.”

He paused dramatically.

“Master Tanaka.”

“Raimundo, you did _not_ just say Izumi’s hooking up with Master Tanaka.”

“Technically, you did. All I know is that their conversation was extremely graphic. And like, illegal, I guess.”

Kimiko blanched. “You guess? He’s a _monk_. He’s supposed to be celibate!”

“But the heart wants what it wants”, Raimundo said, sagely. “Life.”

She scoffed. “Life!”

A silent pause took over the room, partially disrupted by the sound of Kimiko huffing and readjusting her sitting position. After a minute, she finally gave in and sighed.

“I just don’t think Master Tanaka would look twice at the old lady”, she said. “She’s like fifteen years older than he is—like, she’s a grandma!”

Raimundo shrugged. “So? He’s ancient too so it doesn’t matter.”

He paused.

“Besides, Izumi has that look about her you know, like…she looks like she could have been a milf back in her day.”

“…You did not jut call our cook a milf, Rai.”

“Well, at least _I_ say things with my chest!”

* * *

Poker-faced and staring ahead at nothingness, Omi sat next to Clay, both enjoy the silence in each other’s company. Turning another page on his book, Clay gave Omi a look.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

Omi hummed. “Kimiko is running a gambling ring in the temple.”

“Sure, that’s nice”, the cowboy said, eyes on his book. As the rest of the sentence computed, Clay realized that was not normal. “Wait, what?”

“Kimiko is run—”

“Oh, I heard you the first time, partner”, Clay said, shutting his book. “What makes you say that?”

At that, Omi sighed and shrugged. He looked sideways before leaning into Clay’s ear.

“She’s been talking a lot about the Asian Games”, he said. “Keeping track of every game and every sport! That’s not like her!”

The cowboy shrugged and spoke out loud, clearly oblivious to the secret-sharing.

“That doesn’t mean anything, little partner. Everybody in this temple has been keeping up with the Asian Games.”

He paused, raising an eyebrow. “The elders have been keeping up with it more than they keep up with the Olympics’ diving competitions, actually. That’s saying something!”

“It’s because our elders are all from different Asian countries”, Omi explained, waving it off. “They keep up just so they can mock each other whenever someone’s nation loses. Same old, same old.”

Glaring, he paused. “And you derailed my point! Our friend, who has never kept up with sporting competitions like these, is suddenly paying attention. Too much of it!”

“Not everyone who has a new interest is up to something, O”, Clay said. “If that was the case, we’d all have a right to suspect you on any given Sunday.”

Omi side-eyed him. “Kimiko was taking huge wads of money from several people in this temple.”

“Master Huang’s birthday is just around the corner”, Clay said. “You never know.”

The younger boy sighed. He didn’t want to do this, especially since he was sworn to secrecy just this morning, but it had come down to this so he had to use his last card.

“Raimundo’s in on it.”

“Huh”, Clay said, tilting his head. “Kimiko _is_ running a gambling ring in the temple.”

Satisfied he finally got the point across, Omi turned back to his original position, smiling contently. Staring into the horizon a little himself, Clay thought about the situation at hand.

This could go all kinds of wrong. Actually, this definitely would go all kinds of wrong. There was no doubt about that.

Clay could already imagine the tons of speeches Master Fung would give him and he didn’t appreciate the position he was not yet in. He sighed again and opened his book on the bookmarker.

“Omi?”

“Yes, Clay?”

“Pretend like you’ve never told me this.”

“Noted.”

* * *

Raimundo had stirred his coffee about three times before he noticed Omi talking. He’d been a little delirious, but sometimes that’s what a lack of sleep did to him.

“And that’s not all of it!”, Omi was saying, lightly bouncing on his feet, excitedly. “Jermaine also said—”

Raimundo shut his eyes. “Dude, I’m gonna have to be honest with you here. I do not care.”

“You’re the one who told me to tell you what happened.”

“That was yesterday when I did care. You missed your window.”

“But”, Omi began before stopping himself. “Fine, I’ll never speak to you again. I can manage that for the rest of my life, easy.”

The older boy rolled his eyes. “Don’t be petty.”

“Right”, the younger boy said, smiling sarcastically. “That’s _your_ specialty.”

“Okay, fuck you, but nice insult.”

“I try.”

A little curiously, Omi eyed his friend as he drank his coffee, a little too quickly in a desperate means to wake up. He didn’t seem to be doing fine, but then again that was just how Raimundo acted when he’d been asleep before.

After a minute, the older boy noticed the staring. “What?”

“You look like crap”, Omi said, matter-of-factly. “And I know for a fact that you haven’t slept at all last night.”

Raimundo scanned the area to make sure no one had entered the kitchen. “How did you know?”

“Um”, the other boy began. “Your bed wasn’t slept in? And then you came in and slept until three p.m.?”

A little insulted, the older of the boys scoffed. “You don’t have to speak like I can’t understand words.”

“I had to”, Omi said. “You weren’t connecting the dots, but anyway, answer my question.”

Raimundo sighed. “Fine, I was up all night because I was searching for this thing I lost.”

“What did you lose? Something valuable?”

“You could say that”, he said, nodding slowly. “I mean I’m guessing I just misplaced it but—”

At that opportune moment, Master Luo walked into the kitchen. That would have normally been a completely normal thing if the man hadn’t been smiling like a Cheshire cat at the two boys. Well, that and—

“Great Ghost of Dashi”, Omi muttered, a little breathy. “Master Luo is wearing a bathrobe, Raimundo.”

Said friend’s eyes widened. That was unsettling for more ways than one.

“Yeah, I can see that, Omi. Uh, why are you whispering?”

“Obviously”, Omi said, like his friend was a three year-old. “Master Luo is sleepwalking.”

At the mention of his name in a harsh whisper, the old man walked towards Omi. He stood for a second before he reached out and poked his face. After a beat, he poked him again.

“Child”, Master Luo said, giggling a little. “Are you, are you floating?”

Omi tried to keep a pleasant smile as he struggled to avoid the man’s jabbing finger. He gave Raimundo one look, as if asking for help.

“No, Master Luo, Omi isn’t floating”, Raimundo said, getting off his chair finally. “You’re hungry, aren’t you?”

Omi blanched. “What does food have to do with anything, Raimundo, Master Luo is clearly not okay!”

“Just trust me”, Raimundo said. “I only let you down a couple of times, right?”

“That’s not exactly reassuring.”

“Well, it’s supposed to be.”

Oblivious to the exchange, Master Luo slowly turned to face Raimundo. “I do not like you very much.”

“I am aware”, the older of the boys said. “You said that to my face before, but anyway, you hungry?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Okay then”, he said, opening the fridge door. “Sit here and enjoy this—it’s the one time I’m willingly helping you out.”

As he said that, Raimundo took out a couple bags of chips, a few chocolate bars, skittles, leftover dumplings, soup, and sticky mango rice. Setting it on the dinning table, the boy motioned the old man to sit and eat.

“That’s one hell of a meal for indigestion”, Omi commented, rolling his eyes. “And I do not see how this is going to help.”

Raimundo gave his friend a look before shrugging. “It is; it’s gonna help him ride out the effects.”

“Effects of what? What’s going with Master Luo?”

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

“Raimundo”, Omi said, sighing. “What did you do?”

Said boy shrugged. “Technically nothing.”

He paused, deciding whether to continue or not. “Remember when I told you I lost something yesterday?”

“Yes, you said it was valuable.”

“It was”, Raimundo said. “Until Master Luo ate it all.”

Omi took a look the old man before looking back to his friend. Suddenly, realization dawned on his face.

“Raimundo, those weren’t…”

“Pot brownies? Yup, they most definitely were.”

* * *

As he had his evening tea, Clay was beginning to regret coming into the kitchen. Lately, that has been turning into an odd spot at the temple. Just last week, they’d found Master Luo in his bathrobe surrounded by mounds of half-eaten food.

It was weird and unsettling, but right now Clay would take that over this conversation with Kimiko.

“I just understand so much now”, Kimiko was saying, hand on her heart. “Your culture, Clay—it’s just so rich!”

Try as he might not to, Clay rolled his eyes. “Yeah, mm-hmm, rich culture.”

Unnoticing the lack of conversation on her friend’s part, Kimiko kept on gushing and talking and rambling. That was expected. Whenever Kimiko binge-watched a show, she would find an unassuming victim in one of the boys and start rambling about it. It was part of the reason Omi had been so glad to see Clay finally finishing his video-chat to home.

“Save me”, the younger boy had said. “Clay, I’m begging you! It’s been an hour and she hadn’t stopped talking.”

Clay had smiled and politely butted out of the conversation before he agreed to anything, but sadly, Kimiko saw him and she was adamant on speaking to him. See, what she’d binge-watched all fourteen seasons of was…

“Dallas just paints such an intricate picture of the southern life”, she was saying now. “And everyone’s wearing fur coats...did I mention that everyone’s wearing fur coats?”

Clay grimaced. “Yeah, you did.”

“And by the way”, Kimiko said, scrunching her nose. “That thing with Lucy and Ray Krebbs…that wasn’t, like, intentional, was it?”

Offended, the cowboy bristled. “No, of course, not! It’s an accident on the writers’ part.”

“Damn, man, okay”, the girl said, wide-eyed at the tone. “It was just a question.”

Clay sighed. “I’m sorry, Kim, it’s just…why are you watching that trash?”

“Bold statement from a dude who still watches Bridezillas”, Kimiko said with an eyeroll.

“It’s a sociological study”, the cowboy defended. “Meanwhile, Dallas is literally nothing but J.R Ewing getting shot and somehow not dying.”

The Fire Dragon nodded, excitedly. “I know, right?! Such an asshole but you gotta admit that’s a good villain.”

She paused, considering the next statement before allowing it. “Also, his wife’s hot. Like, _I know_ for a fact that if we met she'd be racist to me, but she's such a hot girl.”

Shrugging, Clay took another sip of his tea. He had to figure out a way to get out of this conversation or at least something to tune out Kimiko. Honestly, she was reminding him of someone he’d rather not remember, right now.

“Why the long face”, Kimiko said in a horrible imitation of an accent, probably meant to be Sue Ellen’s. “Is something the matter, darlin’?”

Clay snorted. “If that ain’t a fact, God’s a possum.”

“Wait, I didn’t learn that one yet”, she said, annoyedly. “But really, what’s going on?”

“Nothing, you’re just bringing back some bad memories of mine.”

“You have bad memories associated with Dallas?”

“Yeah”, the cowboy said. “My Aunt Cressida.”

Kimiko squinted in confusion. “Who’s that?”

“Some distant relative”, Clay explained. “She was always talking about Dallas—always J.R this, Bobby that. Nightmare, honestly. That’s not even mentioning Halloween.”

He paused, regretting what he was about to say.

“She made me and my siblings dress up as the Ewing brothers every year until my mama said enough was enough.”

Kimiko’s face lit up with joy. “You’re kidding! Which one were you?”

“…J.R.”

“Clay, I have to see those pictures!”

“You can’t, I burnt them all.”

“Now, I know that’s not true. Your mother probably has copies.”

Realizing the potential in the conversation, Clay decided to make a bargain.

“Fine, if I show you those pictures”, he began. “You cannot use them against me.”

“Deal”, she said, immediately. “Now—”

Clay held up a hand. “Not so fast. And you never come to me for these ramblings post-binge watching, okay?”

“Okay”, Kimiko said, raising an eyebrow. “Are you done?”

“No. And you stop doing the voice, that god-awful accent.”

Sighing, the girl extended her hand to shake on it. Confident he was in the safe zone, Clay smiled for the first time in this conversation.

Noticing the smile, Kimiko scoffed. “You drive a hard bargain, John Ross Jr.”

“_Kimiko_.”

“Fine!”

* * *

The ceiling in the meditation hall was really a work of art, Raimundo realized. One time, Dojo was being particularly chatty and told him that it took almost thirty-three for the full painting of the ancient scene depicted to be painted. Not only that, but it was a collaboration finished by fifty monks.

Honestly, none of that might have interested Raimundo on a normal day, but right now, well, he was being bored out of his mind.

“—dude!”, Clay yelled suddenly, snapping his fingers to get the other boy’s attention. “You gotta help me!”

Blinking, Raimundo gave him a look. “Oh, so you’re done, like, it’s over?”

“No one likes an ass, Raimundo.”

“No one likes a person who spends thirty-seven minutes rambling about a problem either.”

Clay cringed. “Thirty-seven?”

“Oh yeah”, Raimundo said, showing him his phone’s stop-watch. “I timed it and everything.”

“Fine, so I tend to drift off a bit”, the cowboy said. “But right now, I need help, not attitude.”

“You need both”, the other boy said, shrugging. “So, let’s think about this technically. What did Omi say exactly?”

Looking to the ceiling for inspiration, Clay thought about it. The youngest of the Dragons had been talking so animatedly about something that was clearly important to him, prompting Clay to agree to a series of activities he had no recollection of.

“I don’t know, partner, that’s the problem.”

“So, like, what were you guys doing?”

Clay shrugged. “We were watching Nightcrawler.”

“Okay, so that means Jake Gyllenhaal, journalism, potential criminal activity, and legal loopholes”, Raimundo said. “Were possible conversation topics.”

“We did speak at length about Jake Gyllenhaal.”

“And I do not blame you. So?”

“So that somehow turned into a lot of talk about Donnie Darko and like old 90’s cult classics”, Clay began. “And like conspiracies and stuff.”

Raimundo tilted his head a little. “Do you think maybe that had something to do with like a costume party for cult classics?”

“No, Omi doesn’t like those”, the cowboy said. “I’m positive.”

The younger boy shrugged. “Dude, you gotta help me out here. I don’t get this.”

“Look, it’s just I remember that it was something important”, Clay said. “I guess the word 'party' did come up a few times and somehow Omi connected that with zombies? I don’t know.”

The cowboy paused, taking his time trying to figure out what to do with the information. Nothing seemed to connect as much, though, so Raimundo took pity on him.

“You know I always thought the person who did zombies best was Megan Fox”, he began, seemingly out of nowhere. “Like, remember Jennifer’s Body?”

Smiling, Clay nodded, not minding the information at first. As he slowly digested it, though, a look of horror crossed his face.

“Ah, you know what, Rai”, the cowboy said. “I’ve been horn-tossing here all day, winding your mind up and everything. I’ll just figure it out myself.”

Raimundo smiled genuinely. “Fuck are you saying, man? I can still help you if—”

“Nah, partner, I’ll handle it”, Clay said, smiling awkwardly before hurriedly scurrying off.

As soon as the cowboy was out of earshot, the Wind Dragon finally let out his well-contained laughter. He couldn’t believe it, but it really happened. Clay was one step away from letting Raimundo know about the latter’s own surprise birthday party.

The laughter seemed to attract a concerned apprentice, Zhao, from the next room.

“Are you okay?”

Raimundo nodded. “Never better, my friend. Hey, tell me, how does my surprised you-totally-got-me face look?”

* * *

Omi stared into his friend’s eyes. Well, stared was not a right word. Glared was more like it.

“I’m right and you know it.”

“No, you’re not, munchkin!”

Omi grit his teeth. “Stop it, Kimiko. Trying to derail the argument really isn’t going to go your way.”

“What fucking argument?”, the girl said in a slightly raised voice. “There isn’t any! _gyoza _is better than your _jiaozi_—that’s a fact.”

Closing his eyes, the boy sighed. “You’ve deluded yourself, Kimiko.”

“Deluded myself?”

“Yes, you got so fired up about my personal opinion, which is, you know, personal and—”

Kimiko clicked her tongue, cutting him off. “No, no, _no_. You’re the one who made us waste an hour arguing about dumplings, that’s one, and two, you don’t get to talk about not accepting other people’s opinions!”

She paused, taking a breath, and raising both hands.

“I’m done with this.”

“Good”, Omi said, not letting her have the last word. “So was I.”

Though he said he was done with the argument, Omi didn’t leave Kimiko’s door-less doorway. He seemed hesitant, like there was something he had to ask about and he didn’t know how to pitch it.

Raising an eyebrow, the girl stuck a bookmark in the magazine she was reading and gave him a look.

“What? Which Asian cuisine do you want to argue about now?”

“Nothing”, Omi said, truthfully. “I just realized that I’ve never actually had _gyoza_ before.”

Kimiko scrunched her face. “Huh? I guess you’re right. You always go for the Chinese dumplings when we have both options.”

“Well”, the boy said. “In my defense, I didn’t think they’d be good. Also, here we just call them _jiaozi_.”

Rolling her eyes, Kimiko spared them both the ‘I know’ and got off her futon, grabbing her phone before she passed Omi in the doorway.

“Come on”, she said, gesturing him to follow.

Omi followed her, a little confused. “What are we doing?”

“Making _gyoza_”, Kimiko said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

In the kitchen, Omi watched as Kimiko brought out and set most of the ingredients on the table. Luckily, or perhaps predictably because their cook was Japanese, they already had all the ingredients in the kitchen.

Raising his eyebrow, the young warrior somehow found something wrong with the entire scene. Kimiko wasn’t at all lost or clumsy, like she usually was whenever she ever had to help out with meal prep. It was almost as if…

“Good heavens”, Omi began, resignedly. “You know how to cook, don’t you?”

Ignoring the accusation, Kimiko whistled innocently. She impressively carried the tune until it broke, at which point she turned to face the younger Dragon with a smirk.

“And I’m the greatest fucking cook you’ll ever meet too”, she said. “Hand me the chicken.”

Omi gave her a look. “We’ve been living together for five years and you still forget I’m vegan?”

“I knew something was wrong as soon as I said it”, Kimiko said, more to herself. “Fine, then hand me the tofu.”

Doing as he was told, Omi handed Kimiko the ingredients and watched as she worked like an odd imitation of a Martha Stewart. It didn’t help that she was addressing him like a TV audience member either.

When Kimiko was done with the mixture, she and Omi took their seats around the table and began making the actual dumplings. Omi sighed, finally deciding to ask.

“Why do you pretend like you don’t know how cook then?”

Kimiko shrugged. “It’s a lot of things. Mostly I don’t want to.”

“You mean”, Omi began. “Because of all the expectations and stereotypes that society has decreed you need to maintain as a woman, you simply do not do what it wants you to do as a way to rebel against these measures?”

Dropping the dumpling she was making, Kimiko gave Omi a look that was both impressed and intrigued. She tilted her head, considering his words.

“Well, no, I just…didn’t want to do the effort”, Kimiko said. “But what you said is good too.”


	5. Dragons Have Birth Charts Too

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Raimundo's an astrology bitch and those types use astrology for roasting purposes mainly.  
Fun fact: I literally only assigned the signs and this is the actual information I found, I didn't not make one thing up.

“No”, Clay was saying, firmly. “It’s a bunch of hocus pocus and I won’t have it. You’re always trying to fill our heads with crap, Rai, and I respect your commitment to that, but this is too far.”

At that, Raimundo sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. So far, Kimiko and Omi were both on board, which was predictable for the former and kind of strange for the latter, but of course, someone had to play the skeptic.

“Dude, can you please unclench for like two seconds”, Raimundo said. “We’re going to have fun and read our birth charts right after you call your mom and ask her what time you were born.”

Clay’s mouth pursed to a thin line before he spoke. “Hocus. Pocus.”

“Oh my God”, the younger boy said. “You live in a temple in China and you have magic powers you’re supposed to use to defeat the forces of evil and you literally ride a magic dragon every other day.”

He paused, shooting the cowboy a look.

“Pick an angle you can carry, Lil Nas X.”

“Rude yet flattering”, Clay said, tilting his head. “And I don’t wanna do that.”

“Why?”

“Well, for one thing my mom is my stepmom so she might not know the time of my birth.”

“She has your birth certificate, dude, she’d know. Just call her.”

“Not even text?”

“Call. Now.”

Scoffing, Clay did the only thing he’d known would get Raimundo off his back and took his cellphone out. He searched through his video-app contacts, finger hovering over ‘Mom’.

“Hey!”, the cowboy yelled as his friend snatched his phone. “Give that back.”

Raimundo snorted, as he floated out of reach. “No can do—oh hi, Auntie Tam!”

“Raimundo”, Clay said, cupping his hands over his mouth. “I hate you and I know you can hear me.”

“Oh, Clay’s great, Auntie”, the Wind Dragon said, ignoring his friend. “Quick question, though. Do you know when exactly he was born?”

* * *

After a tedious morning and a rambling phone call to Clay’s stepmother in Texas, the Dragons were now lounging in the common area in their bedroom.

With snacks assorted and futons ready and comfortable, the teenagers huddled around their friend and his laptop looking at the home page for a very interesting astrology site.

“I can’t believe we’re doing this”, Clay said. “I know Kimiko's getting into tarot so this makes sense, but Omi, how are _you_ on board with all this?”

Omi shrugged. “I’m curious.”

“It’s so stupid, though”, the cowboy said. “_Everyone_ knows astrology is a sham.”

“You finished? Your daddy loves you now?”, Raimundo said, completely focused on his laptop that he didn’t avoid the punch to his shoulder. “Ow, what the fuck?”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “No more daddy issues jokes.”

“Yeah, I’m not one to talk”, the Wind Dragon said. “Okay, so we’re starting with the skeptic.”

Sighing, Clay looked at the screen as Raimundo typed his date of birth and timing. What followed was a bit confusing, though, with lines and symbols going all over the chart.

“What’s that, Madame Zeroni?”

Raimundo snorted. “Funny. Just like I predicted—Taurus sun, Leo moon, and look at this surprise…Aquarius rising.”

“Yeah”, Kimiko said, nodding. “I don’t understand.”

Omi nodded. “Neither do I.”

“Never mind then”, Raimundo said. “Let’s read it. It says here that you’re country—”

Clay snorted. “Very funny.”

“I’m not joking”, the other boy said, pointing to the laptop. “It says right here, rustic and old-fashioned. You also have an inner desire to share your light and creativity with the world.”

“That’s true”, Kimiko said, smiling. “You’re such a sweetheart, like, it gets annoying sometimes because you remind me of that weird bus chick from the cartoon, but it’s mostly cool.”

Knowing she was talking about Ms. Frizzle, Clay made a face. “Gee, that’s…sweet, Kim.”

“What else does it say?”, Omi asked, annoying shoving at Raimundo’s shoulder. “Keep reading!”

“Fine, cut it out”, Raimundo said. “It always says here all three parts of your trinity—”

“What’s that?”

“Your sun, moon, and rising”, the Wind Dragon said, waving it off annoyingly. “Anyway, they’re all fixed signs so that means you’re very persistent and stubborn, which I for one very much agree with.”

“Second it”, Omi said, putting up two hands at Clay’s raised eyebrows. “What? You tend to be quite stubborn sometimes—it’s okay, own it.”

“I don’t even believe in this stuff”, the cowboy said, jerking a thumb at the laptop. “It’s all hogwash.”

Raimundo smirked. “It literally says you need to accept that others may not share your views, which you’re so not doing right now.”

“Oop”, Kimiko said, giving him an exaggerated shocked expression. “Would you look at that?”

Rolling his eyes, Clay readjusted his seating instead of getting up, like he’d intended to do.

“Fine, let’s hear the rest of it then and I’ll disprove it to you.”

“Fine, Blake Shelton”, the astrology-reading boy said. “Okay, so you’re kind and gentle—will go out of your way to help others.”

Clay hummed, secretly a little pleased at hearing good things about himself while others nodded.

“You love the outdoors and you don’t speak unless you have something important to say.”

“That right there”, Kimiko said, snapping her fingers. “See, Clay? It’s legit.”

“Big deal”, Clay droned. “Anyone could make generic predictions like these. Hit me with the hard ones.”

Raimundo snorted. “Poor choice of words, but fine.”

He paused, scrolling a little down his screen and across a ton of graphs and symbols that read as gibberish to Clay.

“You respect others, but you listen to yourself and you trust in your personal abilities first and foremost”, Raimundo began, as everyone including the cowboy agreed. “Creativity and pragmatism mark your nature, which makes you extremely reliable.”

Another pause.

“You can be very cynical but fair in a constructive way and to your close friends, you are devoted, honest, and trustworthy.”

Raimundo gave Clay a look, which the latter regarded with a shrug. “Keep going.”

“Okay. So, having a Taurus sun and a Leo moon produces a strong, determined will and well-defined opinions. Your Aquarius rising fits this combination well and people with this rising are idealistic and tolerant—you’re also a likable person who can get along with everyone.”

Omi nodded. “So good so far, can we read mine next?”

“I’m not finished”, Raimundo said. “I have two more good things to say: your relationship with your mother—Auntie Tam, you know—gave you a strong sense of self-confidence.”

He paused. “And you can be spontaneous, but you know when to buckle down and work hard for lengths of time.”

“So, like”, Clay began, gesturing vaguely. “What’s the rest down there?”

Raimundo smiled. “Your call-out.”

“Well, read it already”, Kimiko said. “I’m curious.”

“I’m gonna git you for that.”

“Be my guest, cowboy. Read up, dude.”

“Clay’s way into routine”, Raimundo said. “Like way too much, gets it from his parents—like, it literally says he needs to unclench a little, like—”

“We got it, partner”, Clay said, shooting the other boy a glare.

“My bad. You’re emotionally stuck when it comes to letting go of people, even if you need to. You’re so stubborn and people hate that you never change your opinion because once you build a foundation you stick to it forever.”

Raimundo paused.

“Your foundation is your security blanket, so you have a hard time letting that go.”

“I can let go of stuff”, Clay protested, not without a whining tone. “That’s horseshit, I told y’all.”

The other boy clicked his tongue. “It says you can cut ties with literally anyone, but you can keep loving them from afar like the hopeless ruled by Venus romantic you are. Also, you’re the type of person who can try too hard for a lot of people.”

He paused.

“The most frustrating thing about you is that you rarely give an emotional reaction to anything”, Raimundo continued, rolling his eyes more to himself than anything else. “It’s incredibly difficult to move you to rage—or to anything, in general.”

“That’s not—”

“Oh, that’s fucking it”, Kimiko said, scoffing. “Every time I express my feelings, you say I’m overreacting when I just am reacting.”

Omi nodded. “You tend to be somewhat of a robot statue when it comes to being expressive, Clay.”

“You’re very much love-oriented”, Raimundo read out loud, oblivious to the argument. “But anyone who’s crushing on you is out of luck because you rarely let people in—you don’t want them to have an effect in your minimal emotions.”

Another pause.

“All your relationships have to be slowly built up so you can actually let your guard down and allow them in after they’ve gained your loyalty.”

“Makes sense”, Omi said, shrugging. “We didn’t know you had siblings until a year after we met you.”

Clay shrugged it off. “You never asked. You done, partner, or do you got anymore harsh digs?”

Raimundo shrugged. “You say you’re confident and you are to a degree but once you find out you’re not included in things you cry like a little bitch baby. Then it says you’re really into science and other shit.”

“Do mine now”, Kimiko said, patting the boy on his shoulder. “Come on, I have to screenshot it and—”

Omi gave her a look. “We said it’s my turn next?”

“Uh, no, we fucking didn’t?”

“I did! Come on, you always do this, Kimiko! Stop taking my turn.”

“I’m not”, the girl argued. “But if you’re going to be a crybaby about it then fine, go ahead!”

Smiling pleasantly now that he got what he wanted, Omi turned to face the laptop and told Raimundo his birthday and date, down to the minutes.

“If there’s one thing about not knowing who your parents are and being born into a temple of old monks”, Omi began. “It’s that they meticulously write everything down.”

Clay slowly nodded, trying to keep judgement out his tone. “O-kay.”

“A bit predictable here—Pisces sun, Virgo moon, Scorpio rising”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “I could have told you that.”

He paused. “It’s a lot of water, though, so that means you can fearlessly float in the waters of life but you’re also full of tension, always with an inner turmoil. Easily vulnerable, kinda clingy to anyone who approaches. You’re always caught between two worlds—life and death, happiness and suffering.”

No one commented on that, but Kimiko did share a look with Clay as Omi seemed to tense up. Oblivious to that, Raimundo continued reading.

“You can be pretty selfless, sarcastic, so that’s true”, he said, moving along. “You’re very passionate but picky, which makes you come off as a bit of a dick, but it helps maintain your best qualities.”

Omi hummed, clearing his throat. “Yeah, I’ll take that, so are you do—”

“Sensitive, artistic, blah blah blah”, Raimundo said, ignoring the other boy. “You love sports, especially the ones you have to play in water. You’re a fighter by nature with a strong war spirit.”

Kimiko interrupted, as cheerily as possible. “That’s pretty spot on, Omi! Don’t you think so?”

“It’s definitely him alright”, Clay said when the girl nudged him. “You’ve always been one kind of an Ares-like fella!”

He paused. “That’s the god of—”

“I know who that is!”, Omi said, giving Clay a look. “But really? Not even Guan Yu, the literal Chinese god of war, Clay?”

Raimundo rolled his eyes. “Are you two done with whatever the hell this is? I want to keep roasting.”

“Dude”, Kimiko said, flicking him in the ear. “One day we really have to inject you with human emotions—have a sense of perception for like three seconds!”

“I do, I’m just bored”, he said, a little whiningly. “And I’m reading now, so shut up!”

Raimundo paused, taking a little breath.

“You tend to argue and get into conflicts that don’t end well for you”, he said, snorting. “Isn’t that an understatement? Anyway, you tend to go to extremes in everything and you devote yourself to work sometimes.”

He paused again. “You have a strong will and you struggle till the end of the road. You can’t not have an opinion and it always has to be the right opinion because it’s yours and you need to be right always. You’ll have—um, nothing important, scratch that part. Hold on.”

A little curious, Kimiko leaned forward and read the paragraph Raimundo avoided. It’d read that Omi may have a lot of brothers and sisters, so now it made sense.

“You’re very ambitious and you’ll be successful no matter which path you choose in life”, he said.

A pause.

“You’re a natural lead—nope, okay, got it. You’ve got a lot of emotional depth, like, you’re way too concerned about everyone and shit. You try to pretend you’re all logic and above emotion when you’re not and you actually care a lot about other people’s needs.”

Another pause.

“You’re perceptive, observant, and you’re able to read cues in other people’s behaviors. Like, it’s not all true, but close enough. You don’t know what self-restraint is and you can be very rude, like so rude it’s kind of humanly impossible—”

At this, even Omi rolled his eyes, adding a snort. “Okay, we get it, dickhead.”

“Touchy”, Raimundo said, scoffing. “Anyway, you’re a bitter bitch who will always wait for the right moment to take revenge, even if it’s for slights you literally imagined.”

Kimiko gave him a look. “Really? The birth chart says he’s a bitter bitch who won’t quit?”

“That’s some mean astrology right there”, Clay said, adding his voice to the girl’s. “Read the actual thing, Rai.”

Raimundo gestured incredulously. “I am! Why would I make shit up?”

“Because you have a tendency to embellish”, Omi said. “Come on, even you must have known about this.”

“You try to help someone”, Raimundo muttered, shaking his head. “I’m going to continue reading from the chart because that’s what I’ve been doing, you know.”

He paused.

“It says you’re distrustful by nature so you kind fall for tricks easily. You choose to associate yourself with emotional vampires despite knowing from the start they are emotional vampires because you mean well and you want to fix them.”

Omi scoffed. “Well, that’s not true.”

Even before the words were fully out, the three other warriors gave Omi the stink eye.

“Chase Young”, the three said simultaneously, with varying tones.

“And it wasn’t like a one-time thing either”, Clay said. “Honestly, partner, when you especially trust someone on the fly, we all know we’re fuck—in for some trouble!”

“You can curse in front of me, Clay”, Omi said, rolling his eyes. “And you, keep reading.”

Raimundo sighed. “Okay, bossy. So, you don’t know what boundaries are if they hit you in the face.”

“True”, Kimiko said, nodding wholeheartedly. “So true.”

“But that’s only because you want to be close with everyone”, Raimundo continued. “Even though you have trouble opening up to others and letting them in your life like that. You feel like you’re obliged to take care of everyone and to always have solutions, so you like it when people care about you.”

A pause.

“You appear to others as a bit mystical or secretive”, he continued. “There’s a tremendous power in you and people recognize that immediately. You love seeking intense or forbidden experiences to feel alive.”

Another pause. “You’re unassuming but smart, more than a little self-conscious and self-critical, overly critical and judgmental of others but you don’t like it when they judge you—their words, not mine, see—not comfortable with yourself, and you don’t like people who show off.”

Kimiko snuck a look at Omi before nudging the other boy. “Keep reading.”

“You’re a perfectionist and obsessive and you’re really mean when giving advice”, Raimundo said, too loudly for Omi’s tastes. “You’re into health so you have this interest in fitness and nutrition.”

Omi relaxed a bit. “Oh, I guess that’s true—”

“You tend to stress yourself over petty shit and you basically need to chill”, the other boy continued. “Too ideal and you care a lot about the people in your life and you have their best interests at heart. You’re a softie but you don’t show it.”

He paused. “You’re picky with high standards. You come across as cool—okay, so that’s a lie.”

“It’s not”, Clay said, directing his words to the youngest warrior. “Rai, stop being a dick or I swear on my Nana Cathy’s grave—”

Raimundo interrupted, loudly enough to drown the rest of the threat. “Okay, okay, okay, I get it!”

He took a breath and turned his sights on the laptop again.

“Okay, so we’re basically at the end here”, he said. “It says you’re well-put together in appearance and you got an interesting sense of style. You don’t like to call attention to yourself in a superficial way so you don’t overdo it in clothes.”

Kimiko nodded. “That’s true, I wish you’d venture into anything flashy, O.”

“I don’t like that”, Omi said, shrugging. “I look stupid in those type of things, Kimiko.”

Raimundo sighed and continued reading. “You got A+ intuition so you get a good read on people’s emotional nature.”

No one said anything for a minute, so Raimundo gestured vaguely. “I’m done, in case you didn’t notice.”

“Oh, we noticed”, Clay said, huffing slightly. “We’re just trying to…process that.”

Omi nodded. “I know we ended on a positive note but I felt, as you guys say, read to filth!”

“That’s astrology for you”, Kimiko said, shrugging. “And by the way, Rai, you read my chart like this and I’ll end you, ‘kay?”

Raimundo scoffed. “You guys are weak, but fine, your turn now, Witchy Woman.”

Getting up to let Kimiko enter her own information, Raimundo stretched for a while before the girl handed him the laptop back.

He sighed, mentally preparing himself for this. “Okay, wow, so…you got Aries sun, Scorpio moon, and Cancer rising, like goddamn, I feel for you.”

“Is it that bad?”, Kimiko asked. “Or are you just playing around?”

Raimundo made a so-so gesture. “It depends.”

“Well”, Clay said, leaning back for what was sure to be an entertaining reading. “Read up, Walter Mercado!”

After a beat, the cowboy added. “Walter Mercado was a famous—”

“Boricua astrologer and public figure”, Raimundo said, raising an eyebrow. “Why would you assume I _wouldn’t_ know this? I keep up with all the Latino astrologers I can find.”

He paused. “Anyway, so back to _this_ clusterfuck, like, the chart itself says Aries and Scorpio being your sun and moon is a tough combination.”

“Okay”, Kimiko said, slowly. “And?”

“And, okay, let’s start with the good stuff”, Raimundo said. “You see life like a battlefield.”

“That, it is.”

“…Sure, and you’re competitive as fuck and you’re easily provoked into challenges. You have this need to prove yourself to yourself and then to everyone else.”

He paused. “You’re energetic and determined, bold, crazy brave, daring, actually a bit stupid when it comes to impulse control.”

“Noted”, Kimiko said, pursing her lips. “I’m so gonna kick your ass when you’re done.”

Raimundo scoffed. “We didn’t even get to the juicy bits, hold your horses.”

Another pause. “You’re focused on achieving victory in any and all fields of life. You’re greatly positive and optimistic, you never listen to anyone’s advice and you’re stubborn as fuck.”

“Can’t argue with facts”, Clay said, sagely. “See, Kim? I told you.”

Kimiko glared. “You don’t even believe in this, you said it yourself.”

“I’m open to some mind-changing if it gets better, you know.”

“Okay”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “You hate losing, you’re fiery and direct—what an understatement, but okay—straightforward in all areas of life, not gentle, maybe even a little aggressive.”

“I see what you mean”, Omi said, nodding to Clay. “This is some piping hot tea.”

Raimundo snorted. “It’s lukewarm at best, O, we all know she’s kind of a—”

“Watch it”, Kimiko said, moving her glare to all three boys. “You’re all treading very dangerously and you don’t want to. Trust me.”

The Brazilian boy smirked. “You’re unique, mysterious, and fierce and—ooh, okay, here’s where it gets interesting.”

He paused, more dramatically than often.

“You’re generally likable at first, super caring, always asking people questions, always sweet and shit”, Raimundo said. “Give it two weeks, though, and you’re the face of torture—like, it’s a 180-degree switch and you let your me-first, incurably independent, kinda self-involved side shine through.”

Kimiko crossed her arms. “Fine, carry on.”

“You take the least significant things and hold grudges over them. You keep yourself from truly getting to know people because you’re just hyper-protective of that soft vulnerability you try to pretend you don’t have.”

Leaning back even more, Clay muttered. “Jesus, that’s harsh.”

“You’re a bit of a momma bear kind of person”, Raimundo continued. “You have this unrelenting inner strength, tenacity in difficult times, you’re very protective of the people you love, and you gotta strong imagination and a brilliant mind.”

Kimiko barely smiled. “Thank you—”

“You’re also incredibly moody. You’re also overly emotional in private, touchy, clingy, and unable to let go even if there’s nothing left to leave.”

A pause.

“You’re strong-willed, charismatic as fuck, and incredibly self-confident. You suffer because of your strong irritability, you’re kinda indecisive. As a child, you were very clingy to your parents. You’re kind of an emotional blackmailer, always ready to remind people about what you did for them.”

Kimiko cleared her throat. “Okay, if you’re going to, like, scalp me, can you at least not sound so gleeful about it?”

“Will do”, Raimundo cheerily said. “Anyway, you can’t put up with a situation where you don’t understand everything because you’re a know-it-all. You’re constantly wishing to push ahead.”

“Good so far, right?”, Omi said, giving Kimiko an apologetic look.

The girl shrugged. “I guess.”

“Yeah, wait for this”, Raimundo said. “Love is hard for you.”

“Way to kick me when I’m down, dude.”

“I couldn’t miss the opening, you know me”, he said. “You hold back too much and, you know, love kinda requires trust. You’re a bit secretive, kinda sturdy within, kinda masculine but in a hot way—I swear, it says that. You’re also reserved, somewhat.”

“Are you done?”

“Nope, you tend to make people go through trials tribulations to prove they’re actually there for you and those trials never stop. They just get subtler as time goes on because you always up the ante like a two-faced Jigsaw.”

“Raimundo”, Kimiko said, face completely neutral. “Will you say _ever_ anything that’s remotely good about my personality and character?”

Said boy shrugged. “I’m about to, listen to this. You’re crazy seductive, like, people can’t not notice you and you don’t even try to catch anyone’s attention. You’re proud and intuitive.”

A pause.

“You’re intrigued by mysteries; you like to cross limits and break taboos. You’re very intelligent, analytical, and creative. You’re always eager to risk everything.”

“Okay, it’s getting marginally better”, Kimiko said, sighing. “So, I know you’ve got some shit saved up. Hit me.”

Raimundo didn’t need any prompting. “You’re a bit obsessive and difficult to approach. It takes a lot to win you over. You’re possessive and hard to deal with at times.”

“_Nandeyanen_”, Kimiko said, pinching the bridge of her nose. “You done?”

“Almost. You don’t know what chilling is because you can’t just sit down and relax. You always feel compelled to be doing shit and if you’re not doing shit, you’ll be picking a fight so you won’t be bored.”

A pause. “Arguing is basically a drug for you. You get shit done because you have the shortest fuse and the most determination out of everyone around you. Watching you at work is like watching a powerhouse in action.”

Raimundo shrugged. “And I’m done.”

“Yeah”, Kimiko said, nodding. “And so are we. Does everyone’s charts read like an aggressive semi-psychoanalysis?”

“Most of them yeah”, he said. “So, I’ll get going and—”

Omi blinked once. “Go where, Raimundo?”

“To take a nap”, said boy said. “I have to not exist for a few hours and—”

“Take a rain check, Rai”, Clay said, crossing his arms. “We’re doing your chart next.”

“I’ve _seen_ my chart, though.”

Kimiko made a face. “We didn’t and, besides, you kinda read us to filth so we deserve to do that, too. Give me the laptop.”

“I got a lot of personal shit here, though”, Raimundo said, nervously. “I wouldn’t feel comfortable.”

“So fucking what?!”

“Guys, come on”, he said. “You’re being ridiculous. This was all in good fun.”

Omi nodded, smiling pleasantly. “Yes, and the fun has to continue, don’t you think? Give Kimiko your computer, Raimundo, or I’ll have to use my Lotus strike on you.”

He paused, smile turning cocky.

“And I’ve finally mastered it.”

“I’ll take my chances with you, Big Head”, Raimundo began, taking the apt time to roll his eyes and make a rude gesture. “What’s the worst you could do? K—hey!”

While Omi was successfully getting under Raimundo’s skin, Clay took the opportunity and snatched the laptop from the latter’s unsuspecting clutches. Raimundo ran across the room, trying to snatch the laptop back before the cowboy handed it to Kimiko.

“Kimiko”, Raimundo said, giving her a charming smile. “My partner in crime and trash talk, can you please—”

“Save it, dude”, she said, smirking. “Try to interrupt me and your laptop is toast. And you know I mean it _literally_.”

Incredulous, the Wind Dragon looked from teammate to teammate. “God, you’re all a bunch of assholes.”

“We learned from you”, Clay said, proudly. “So that kinda backfired, didn’t it?”

Kimiko turned to the reluctant warrior. “Birth time?”

“I’m not saying it”, Raimundo grumbled. “And good luck trying to call my mother. She doesn’t remember and we kinda lost my birth certificate.”

Omi squinted in confusion. “How do you kind of lose someone’s birth certificate?”

“It’s a long story”, Raimundo said. “Short version is my Vovó was drunk and misplaced it.”

Huffing, Clay crossed his arms again. “So what do we do now?”

“Nothing”, Kimiko said before anyone else could speak. “He has his info saved up, guys, I got it.”

Sighing resignedly, Raimundo nodded, more to himself than to anyone else.

“Fine, bring it. I can handle it and none of you bitches will break me.”

Omi shrugged. “We love a good challenge. Read on, Kimiko.”

“Sure”, the girl said, needing no prompting. “So, Libra sun Cancer Moon Sagittarius rising.”

Kimiko dramatically paused, throwing her friends a look.

“At your core, you like balance but others constantly interrupt those dreams so you protect yourself with bitterness. Your moral foundation seems off to people because it's not guided by generally accepted opinions.”

“So good so far”, Clay said, nodding. “Maybe there _is_ something to this whole astrology thing.”

Nodding, Kimiko continued. “Behind the mask of suspicion and inflexibility lies a charming nature. You don’t like to show your vulnerability. You love scaring people off with your energy. You’re too sarcastic, you have a rich imagination and bit of a temper.”

“Nice, true, true”, Omi said, nodding. “Keep going.”

“Okay”, Kimiko said. “You’re sociable, refined—yeah, that second one is so not true—and kind. You love using mental booby traps to get others to confide in you because you love secrets.”

The youngest of the warriors nodded sagely. “You do love a good secret, don’t you, Raimundo?”

“Sue me”, Raimundo said, rolling his eyes. “It’s good for leverage. And entertainment.”

The reading girl continued, paying the pair little to no mind. “You’re a tad manipulative and really into flirting. You love charming people with words but you might ditch them just as easily—wow, even your _birth_ _chart_ says you’re a fuckboy.”

“Shut up”, Raimundo said. “It says good things too.”

“Yup”, Kimiko said, nodding. “It says right here you’re prone to jealousy and resentment, you’re arrogant, always on the defensive. You’re always struggling for freedom so you think even shouldering regular responsibilities is too much work. You hate forcing yourself to do stuff even if they are important.”

She paused.

“You think of yourself as outstanding so you act like everyone has to bend to your every wish—wow, tell me about it—and you sometimes forget that other people have feelings too. You’re incredibly judgmental to the point where you might stand in a corner and refuse to interact with anyone.”

“Yeah, right”, Raimundo said, rolling his eyes. “I never—”

Clay shook a finger. “Not on my watch, buddy. That was _literally_ you the first day we got here.”

“You were being very judge-y”, Omi agreed. “I think you said your first words to us after three hours had passed and that was because you needed help finding the bathroom.”

Raimundo shrugged. “You can’t blame me. That was a new environment.”

“It was for all of us”, Kimiko said, shrugging. “And—oh, look at this! It says here you call people close-minded when they don’t agree with you, like fucking hell, that is you!”

Omi agreed. “Water is wet.”

“You have a problem differentiating rudeness and being truthful, you can’t tell someone the truth without being offensive”, the girl continued. “You don’t commit to anything. You use your charm to your advantage.”

A pause.

“You wrestle with your own morality. Fighting with you is exhausting because you’re always acting like you’re being fair. You can’t choose shit and with the whole “charm” thing it means your love life is a mess.”

Another pause.

“You have a careless elegance about you. You’re way into sports and you love travelling and you quickly adapt to different ways of life. You have an ability to learn new languages easily.”

“I’ll take it”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “So, since we’re all done—”

Clay grabbed him by the arm before he could go any further. “Who said we’re done? There is still some harsh truth we can dole out, right Kim?”

“Yes, there is”, Kimiko said, beaming. “You can’t be reasoned and you can’t take the truth you love dishing out so much.”

Omi snorted. “This is literally what’s happening now.”

The girl nodded. “Exactly, right? You have a narcissistic streak and you’re a bit codependent. You can get emotional out of nowhere and refuse to say anything but you expect everyone to understand.”

Pausing, Kimiko read some more before shrugging.

“That’s basically it, it’s over.”

Clay frowned. “Really? Dang, I was having fun.”

“Yeah? Because you’re evil”, Raimundo said, throwing in a glare. “You’re just enjoying seeing everyone exposed.”

“So…you mean the same as you?”

“That’s different and you know it. I’m _proud_ of the evil streak I have.”

Ignoring the bickering pair, Omi directly addressed Kimiko. “Is that _really_ it? I thought we’d all get to read about the compatibility stuff too. Jermaine’s an Aquarius.”

“Compatible”, Raimundo said with a shrug. “Like, it’s so obvious, don’t you think?”

Clay raised an eyebrow. “What about me?”

“You’d go well with a Virgo, Pisces, Gemini, or Sagittarius”, he said, nodding once to the girl who was giving him a curious look. “And, Kim, your best matches would be with a Leo, Libra, Scorpio, or a Pisces.”

Kimiko crossed her arms. “Fine and what about you?”

“Mine are Aries, Leo, Virgo, and Capricorn”, Raimundo said. “I already dated a few of them, so I wouldn’t say that bit is completely accurate.”

Silence came over the room quickly as the teenagers began to look at their phones and at the ceiling. Bored with all the quietness, Omi sighed and broke it first.

“So, what are you guys doing now?”

Raimundo shrugged. “Nap time, I guess.”

“I was going to find something on to watch”, Kimiko said, tilting her head. “Keiko said they started airing the new Terrace House season.”

“I was going to call Patrick; he said he wanted help with some school project”, Clay said. “You need something, Omi?”

Said boy shook his head. “No, but I was thinking maybe we could all do something together, like, go to the mall or something.”

At that, three teenagers shared looks and shrugs and noncommittal mutters, with Kimiko taking the lead.

“I’m in”, she said. “I wanted to get fries. And a burger. And a milkshake—oh my God, let’s go now, I’m _starving_!”

Raimundo nodded. “I could eat as long as someone else is paying.”

“Right, your parents haven’t sent your allowance yet”, Clay said, sympathetically. “I still have some money from last month’s allowance so I can cover your tab this time.”

“Great, let’s go then”, Kimiko said, leading the way out the door. “I was also dying to get this…um, Omi, are you coming?”

Omi didn’t speak. Actually, he didn’t respond at all. Right now all he could do was stare in blank shock at the group, jaw dropped.

Smirking gleefully, Raimundo took a step forward and lightly knocked on his friend’s head.

“A huge head and look?”, the older boy said. “Nobody’s home.”

Omi smacked his friend’s hand away from his face with a scowl. “Shut up! Guys, I just had an important, life-changing realization.”

“What’s wrong?”, Clay began, worriedly. “A vision? End-of-the-world situation?”

“Maybe for you, specifically”, Omi said, a small smirk starting to appear on his face. “Jack Spicer is a Gemini!”

Pausing for the others to process what he just said, the youngest warrior began a chant that Kimiko and Raimundo both helped carry.

“Clay and Spicer sitting in a tree—”

“Really, fellas? I thought we got past this childish nonsense last year.”

“You’re only mad because you can’t join in! Anyway, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to reiterate, I didn't make one bit up and that's a bit weird honestly but also cool, I guess?


	6. Super Rich Kids

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This has definitely happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't really know if I wanted to include Jack in this or not, but I decided he'll be featured sometimes. Also, this one's a bit short.

Another day, another function, Kimiko thought as she crossed her arms and pretended to listen to the odd conversation happening with the two ladies around her.

Her mouth hurt from smiling too hard and she knew that once she was back at the temple someone—likely Raimundo—was going to ask her why she had a Joker smile but she just had to keep it together for a few hours.

This event was apparently important for Papa, but then again what event wasn’t? Recently, these parties—well, “parties”—became his first method of sealing business deals and for certain occasions, Kimiko had to go too now.

“Rich people like to show off”, her father had told her when she asked him why her presence was suddenly required. “I have to show my status to get things and status is shown through clothes, taste in food, mannerisms, and how much one’s family looks like money.”

He’d then paused and said the most terrifying thing Kimiko had ever heard, with the weirdest accent imitation too.

“What do you young people always say? If you got it, you flaunt it.”

So, that was as disturbing as any event, Kimiko guessed, but then again her father was a little right and she was going to ask for a raise in her allowance sometime soon anyway so she went along with it.

“Maybe I should have just ignored Papa’s texts”, Kimiko said, as she recorded a voice note to the Dragons’ group chat. “It’s like the eighth circle of hell in terms of boredom here and I’ve already heard like way too many conversations about plastic surgery.”

She paused, turning around and beginning her trek to the buffet table she spotted a waiter coming from.

“Okay, so the food looks nice”, she continued into the lengthy audio message. “But that’s about it. The fashion’s wack, the music’s wack, and the—_hey_, watch it!”

Stumbling a little from the weight of the push backwards, Kimiko steadied herself and regained her balance before setting her glare on the person who bumped into her.

Oddly enough, instead of yelling, the girl smirked.

“No fucking way”, Kimiko said. “Spicer, are you auditioning for the Nutcracker? The fuck are you wearing?”

Jack Spicer scoffed, giving her a once-over. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“I’m being retro on purpose”, she said, a tad defensively. “But my hair’s on point, not that I can say that about yours.”

“I couldn’t put my hair gel this morning”, he retorted. “Because I had to look boring for this event, okay?”

He paused.

“By the way, why are you here? Is there a Wu in the pudding or something?”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “No, ass-for-brains, I came here for my _dad_.”

“Oh, right”, Jack said, as if only remembering. “I always forget you’re New Money even though you make it extremely hard with all the tacky wigs.”

Crossing her arms, Kimiko smirked. “Just because your family’s money is in, like, molasses or something doesn’t mean you get to make fun of mine. Besides, you’re probably jealous.”

“Of what?”

“Of the fact that I was middle class before so I’m, like, a person who’s not lost in touch and is actually pretty likable by everyone.”

“Please”, Jack said, scoffing. “Like I’d be jealous of being poor.”

“Okay, just because we weren’t as rich before doesn’t mean we were poor.”

“That sounds like something a previously poor person would say, but no judgement.”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “God, you’re such a pest. It’s physically paining me how much I need to punch you.”

“I’ve had worse threats”, Jack said, shrugging. “So where are the other losers lurking?”

“They’re not here”, she said, failing to not sound whiny. “Papa said I couldn’t invite them anymore.”

“Like separately or together?”

“Both”, Kimiko said. “They pulled a lot of shit in both cases.”

She paused, smirking a little.

“Last time Rai was here he spent all his time pestering the attendees about investing in his hometown football club and Omi asked too many questions about literally everything.”

Another pause. “And he, like, accidentally insulted the Emperor of Japan, so…”

Jack nodded. “Okay, so I can see his point with those two, but what about Clay?”

“Clay punched a really old dude here once”, Kimiko said, shrugging it off. “I really don’t remember what about, but to be fair his drink was spiked with vodka so I couldn’t blame him.”

“And who spiked his drink?”

“…Me, but that’s beside the point.”

Jack was a little impressed. “That’s somewhat evil of you.”

“It was a mistake but I know, I know”, Kimiko said, shrugging and walking to a nearby empty chair. “If I make a career shift now, I can easily put all you so-called villains out of business so be happy I’m generous.”

“Thank you, your highness”, Jack said, taking a seat too. “For leaving villainy to us and deciding to take on the high society instead.”

She snorted. “_Yabai_, I wish I was high because that was probably the only way I’d get to enjoy it here.”

A pause.

“You don’t happen to like have anything on you now, right?”

Jack raised an eyebrow. “No? Why would I bring weed to an auction?”

“Oh, is that what this is?”, Kimiko said, a little surprised. “I thought it was a fancy cocktail party.”

“It is for the regular guests”, the boy genius agreed. “The super-secret auction is in the secret library upstairs and it’s for the VIP, so you might notice that _my_ parents aren’t around.”

Kimiko scoffed. “_My_ dad isn’t around too, you know.”

Another pause.

“So, you don’t happen to know when this thing is going to get a little bit fun?”

“I hate to break it to you, Tohomiko”, Jack said with an eye-roll. “But this party is actually the most fun of all the events I’ve ever been to.”

Kimiko’s jaw dropped. “Tell me you’re joking.”

“Oh, I wish I was!”

Silence took over for a while, as some more classical music was played and the guests mingled and chattered some more.

At one point, an old blonde woman came over and greeted Jack and then Kimiko, after a quick introduction. Jack hadn’t been too pleased with that and every moment they’d spotted the woman afterwards, he kept muttering something along the lines of “fucking Cathy”.

“Fine, I’ll bite”, Kimiko began after the incident repeated itself for the seventh time. “What’s your problem with her?”

Jack shrugged. “Her fake teeth and fake attitude? Her I’m-totally-still-twenty-one blonde dye-job? What _isn’t_ my problem with her?”

He paused, seething a little.

“Also, that’s Cathy Cabot, Ashley’s mom, so I have to hate her regardless.”

When he saw the girl didn’t really compute what he’d said, Jack blinked twice and repeated.

“Ashley’s mom? Like, Annoying Ashley”, Jack said. “Like, _Katnappe_ Ashley.”

Realization finally dawned on Kimiko. “Oh, Dollar Store Cat-woman.”

“Sure, let’s call her that”, he said, rolling his eyes. “But anyway that’s her mom.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Well, either one of them had too much work done. I wouldn’t have thought they were even related and most white people look the same to me.”

“They both had surgery”, Jack said, shrugging. “I guess Dumb Cathy had more only because she’s been alive more.”

He paused, crossing his arms again.

“I hate that woman so much; you don’t even know. She insists on treating me like her daughter’s stereotypical gay best friend even though she knows I can’t stand her entire family.”

“I get it”, Kimiko said. “That’s how Keiko’s grandma acts all the ti—well, not all the time, usually half that time she tries to argue with me that I’m just confused and not actually bisexual.”

Jack snorted. “I hate those people so much.”

“Same here.”

After another moment of silence, the evil boy genius gave the warrior a look that was both intriguing and borderline creepy.

“What?”, Kimiko asked, flatly.

Jack smiled. “We should start a GSA group!”

“For who?”, she asked, squinting. “Like, all the kids from the neighboring town or…?”

“No, no”, he said, waving that off. “I hate them all, I meant like for the Xiaolin-Heylin thing, you know.”

Kimiko snorted. “Yeah, you do know everyone’s, like, gay there right? You wanna start a GSA, then you’ll need an S.”

“Ashley’s straight”, Jack said, shrugging. “I don’t know about Vlad but—”

“Spare me, Katnappe’s literally a basic ass white girl without any of the fun drama and I can barely tolerate you for the time being without bringing any of your ‘friends’.”

“Why the air-quotes, I do have friends!”

“Yeah, right! You have zero friends; it’s why you keep texting my fake number!”

Jack blanched. “You gave me a fake number?”

“Well, duh”, Kimiko said, rolling her eyes. “Why would I ever give you my real number?”

“Touché, but that doesn’t explain how you know I text you…sometimes.”

“It’s my Baa-Baa’s number”, she explained. “She thinks you’re like a very friendly stalker so it’s giving her a weird self-esteem boost, which is very good for a woman her age, don’t you think?”

Jack winced. “I’ve been texting your grandmother for two years? And she’s never even responded—ouch, that one hurts.”

“Yeah, she doesn’t respond to numbers she doesn’t have saved. Be happy she didn’t file a restraining order.”

“Oh, I’m flattered.”

After a beat, Kimiko turned to Jack with a bored expression on her face, signaling the start of a very rude conversation.

“Hey, Jack?”

“Yeah?”

“You really need a makeover.”

“Weird way to kick me while I’m down, but okay?”, Jack said, snorting. “I happen to think I look fine the way I am.”

Kimiko pursed her lips. “That’s the tragedy of it. You can’t pull this…whatever you’re trying to do off.”

“It’s a goth look”, he defended. “It’s goth, it’s supposed to be like this.”

She furrowed her eyebrows. “Really? Because whenever I try my hand at this look, people tell me I look like the goddess Izanami. You, on the other hand, look like a child who got lost in a rundown Hot Topic.”

There was a pause before she added, “In 2003.”

“Okay, so there goes my last shred of self-esteem”, Jack said, biting the inside of his cheek.

“And that’s why you should go for a makeover”, Kimiko said. “At least fix the surface problems.”

“You’re mean.”

“And you’re poorly dressed always, so?”

Jack shrugged. “I don’t know, are you going to do my makeover?”

“No”, Kimiko said. “This is already as far as I can go with socially interacting with you, Jack. I still haven’t and _will never_ get over the fact that you kidnapped me.”

“That was a long time ago, I was like twelve or something!”

“It really messed me up, you asshole. I couldn’t even look at a robot for a few months because I’d go into Hulk-mode and guess what my dad does for a living!”

“Okay, fair point”, Jack allowed. “So, who’s going to do my high school movie makeover?”

“I could give you the number to one of my stylist friends”, Kimiko said, shrugging. “She’s really good.”

Jack was a little curious. “No discount?”

“I thought you Old Money types didn’t believe in discounts”, Kimiko said, smirking. “Either way, no, you’re rich so just pay up.”

“Fine, I guess”, he said, taking a beat to think. “Okay, so I have a random question.”

“Shoot.”

“Do you think we’d have been friends if we went to the same high school? Like, if the whole Mystical Conflict thing never happened?”

Kimiko took a moment to think before shaking her head. “Nah, I don’t think so. I’d probably push you into a locker or something.”

“I knew it”, Jack said, shrugging. “To be honest, the feeling’s mutual, I don’t think we’d mesh well as friends. Like, not now at least.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, I think we make good frenemies but that’s about it.”

“Exactly”, he said, nodding. “I love that we get to be hostile to each other and that I don’t have to hold back my insults because you have “feelings” or whatever.”

“Right, and I can insult your fashion and life choices and not feel bad at all because I don’t like you that much.”

Silence reigned for a few moments, with more guests buzzing about and more of Jack insulting Dumb Cathy every time she passed, though now it was more out of ritual than out of vitriol.

Breaking the silence, Kimiko crossed her arms and gave Jack a look.

“You’d probably have been best friends with Omi”, she said. “Like, in that hypothetical situation.”

Cringing slightly at first, Jack sighed and allowed it. “Yeah, you’re right. That munchkin would have definitely grown on me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- every time I think Jack I think Will Poulter which is weird tbh
> 
> -Izanami is the Japanese goddess of death 
> 
> \- rich kids are weird
> 
> \- it's always good to argue with your frenemy


	7. The Apology

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meaningless shenanigans squad back at it again, featuring distressed ancient temple guardians.

In hindsight, the tension was always going to come to a peek. All the fighting, yelling, half-assed commentary, and acidic jokes were all going to amount to a very unpleasant evening and Dojo knew it.

The thing was, though, he hadn’t imagined the four Dragons-to-be would choose today of all days to blow up. Or that Master Fung would choose _him_ of everyone around to solve it.

“I’m so over this”, the ancient dragon muttered under his breath. And he was, too. He was about thirty minutes late to the reunion on Dragon Island and this time, his elders weren’t going to be as kind.

Kimiko, directing her glare at Clay, agreed. “You’re right, Dojo. I’m over it, too—this is just _stupid_!”

“Hey, watch it”, Clay said, pointing a finger at the girl. “I may be the nice guy but I can muster enough anger to be incredibly unbearable.”

“Watch it? Really?”, she said, standing in a way that made her look taller. “You know, if you’re looking for trouble, you’ve already hit jackpot, Billy Ray!”

“I resent that—”

Raimundo chose that as a moment to butt in, gesturing with his coffee mug. “See, Dojo? This is what I—what _we_ have to live with. There’s so much meaningless aggression and pettiness, it’s enough to turn a person batshit crazy.”

“I don’t usually agree with Raimundo because I don’t like to”, Omi said, nodding. “But he has a point here. It’s like this all the time.”

Hearing this sacrilege, Kimiko rolled her eyes and took a stand.

“Oh, look who’s talking”, she began. “I won’t stand here and get a lesson on pettiness from _Petty-rosa_ or you, Omi! You guys know we have eyes and ears in this temple and we all know who brings the fights more here, right?”

Clay nodded. “Exactly, I get into my fair share of fights but, if anything, I’m not the one who starts most of these fights.”

Before any other teenager could speak up, Dojo raised his claws in a timeout gesture and floated to the middle of the infighting circle. He really had no time for this, so this plan better work.

“I have heard more than enough”, Dojo said, exasperatedly. “So, here’s what’s going to happen and I don’t want any backtalk. You’ll apologize.”

Just as the dragon expected, the teenagers began a roar of disagreement and dissent almost immediately, each trying to out-yell the other. Whistling loudly, Dojo took the floor again.

“Did you hear the part about me not wanting any backtalk?”

Kimiko crossed her arms. “Well, yeah, but you’ve got it twisted if you think I’m going to apologize to Clay when clearly he’s the one in the wrong.”

“Good to know”, Dojo said. “Because that wasn’t my point. You’re all going to apologize to each other.”

“What?”, Clay asked, confused. “The fight’s between me and Kimiko.”

Raimundo agreed, gesturing around. “Exactly! I didn’t even do anything this time.”

“Yes”, Dojo agreed. “But you will. And so will Omi.”

Omi shot him a look. “Why, why are you bringing me into this? This is why I stayed silent.”

“Because”, the dragon repeated, exasperatedly. “You two will get involved at some point and it will all be a great stinking mess. So, we’re fixing it now.”

Sharing looks and scoffs, the teenagers thought about the dragon’s words and began giving begrudging sounds of agreement, one by one. Pleased, Dojo gestured each to take their seat.

“Perfect”, Dojo said, gesturing to the nearest person to him, Omi. “Okay, now you can begin, Omi.”

Omi shrugged. “I have nothing to apologize for, though.”

“Really?”, the dragon asked. “Nothing at all? This entire week you have not gotten into fights or pissed off any of your teammates?”

At that, the youngest warrior took a pause which made the other teenagers snicker and scoff.

“God”, Raimundo said. “You have to _think_ about it? You already know you piss off several people unintentionally.”

“Some of us like to use our brains”, Omi sharply retorted, before catching Dojo’s glare. “And that’s the first thing I’d like to apologize for. Also, I’d like to apologize to Kimiko and Clay for calling this fight stupid.”

Clay nodded. “None taken. I guess I have to apologize for yelling too loudly while you were trying to read.”

“Yeah, about that”, Omi said, a tad sheepishly. “Kimiko, I’d like to apologize again because I was trying to translate your dairy.”

Kimiko almost took a step closer to the boy before Dojo cleared his throat as a warning, so she settled for crossing her arms and glaring menacingly.

“You were trying to do what? How many times did I tell you not to go into my stuff and just—how did you even unlock it, I have an electronic password.”

When Omi said nothing, preferring to stare at the floor, Raimundo sighed and began.

“And this is my cue, I guess”, he said. “Kimiko, I’m sorry your password was incredibly easy to crack.”

Noticing the tension, Dojo shot the boy a look. “Try again.”

“I’m sorry you don’t know how to set up passwords.”

“Raimundo!”

“Fine”, said boy said, taking a deep pause. “I’m so, I guess I’m a little sorr—I’d like to perhaps apolo—shit, I don’t think I can do this!”

Kimiko squinted at him. “It won’t kill you to apologize, you know the words.”

“Do I?”, Raimundo asked. “Apologies are subjective.”

Clay stepped in. “Rai, it’s not that hard. Check this out. Kimiko, I’m sorry that whenever we try to have civil discussion it goes incredibly out of proportion and it gets everyone else involved.”

He paused, muttering. “Of course, that’s usually your doing.”

“Apology accepted”, Kimiko said, a big smile on her face. “And I’m sorry you’re incredibly judgmental and you think Texas is the best place anyone can live even though you haven’t actually lived anywhere else.”

Pausing, she turned to Omi. “I’m sorry you can’t identify privacy and boundaries if they hit you in the face.”

“That’s not fair”, Omi began, put on the spot. “I was just curious and—”

“And I’m sorry you still blame everything on your curiosity rather than just admitting you’re a nosy bitch like the rest of us!”

Raimundo snorted. “I should have brought my _coxinhas_, this is just pure entertainment.”

“Oh, don’t be pretending you’re off the hook”, Kimiko said, effortlessly turning to face the boy. “You haven’t even apologized to me yet, you’re continually helping breach my privacy and—”

Dojo cleared his throat. “Kimiko, we’re supposed to be building bridges not burning them. Even if you _are_ better at that than me.”

“Fine”, she said, smiling sweetly. “Raimundo, you won’t be getting any of my premium gossip until you apologize. And you won’t be getting any mercy either.”

Raimundo heard the threatening undertones loud and clear. “Fine, I guess I can say I’m so, I’m sorry I unlocked your diary for Omi to read. Now, we done?”

“Nope”, Clay said. “You still got to apologize to me and Omi.”

The Wind Dragon scoffed. “Fine, I guess that I’m sorry, Omi, that I did not tell you to not go into other people’s things. And, Clay, I’m sorry the Dixie Chicks still haven’t released a new album.”

“Funny”, the cowboy said, meaning he didn’t find this at all humorous. “I thought you’d apologize for taking my shirt, my _favorite_ shirt, behind my back, wearing it and throwing it back all dirty in my laundry like I won’t notice?”

“Oddly specific”, Kimiko said, more to herself than anything. “And disgusting.”

Raimundo took a second to process. “Why would I even steal that shirt? You know how much flannel irritates me.”

“Well, someone did”, Clay said. “And yes, my first suspect is you because you usually do this and—”

“Gee, that’s not a loaded sentence or anything”, Raimundo said. “It’s not like racism is a thing so you immediately assume _I_, out of everyone here, would steal your ugly ass shirt.”

Sensing trouble, Dojo floated to the two teenagers before things could get any worse.

“Hey, hey now! This is—"

Omi chuckled a little nervously, interrupting the dragon. “Guys, I think I have a confession to make.”

“_Kuso_”, Kimiko said, smirking as she saw the way the two other boys’ reactions changed. “Someone made a misjudgment he’s about to regret!”

“You betcha”, Clay said, deadpanned and dreading the next sentence. “What, Omi?”

“Yeah, what Omi?”, Raimundo said, smirking victoriously. “I can’t wait to hear you bring this cowboy down.”

Omi smiled awkwardly. “I took Clay’s flannel, I was trying out some clothes and I thought the oversize look would suit me. I know I should have asked but it slipped my mind, I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay, partner”, Clay said, nodding. “As long as you apologize and ask next time.”

Nodding, the youngest warrior was a little lost in his thoughts, as he remembered the exact outfit he was trying on. “I have to say, though, those flannels kind of worked with the Dior Jordan’s.”

“Bite your tongue, that’s sacrilegious”, Raimundo said, giving him a look. “And how would you even know, like unless you, you—oh my God, Omi, tell me you did _not_ wear my Dior Jordan 1’s.”

“You are right, Rai”, Kimiko said, easily taking the coffee mug out of the boy’s grip and taking a sip. “This is pure entertainment. Delicious coffee, too.”

Raimundo paid her no mind, glaring at Omi, who made the effort to smile before he answered his older friend’s question.

“Technically, I cannot say I didn’t wear them because that would be a factual lie.”

“Yeah, well, I’m about to go factual all over your ass! Do you know how much I saved up to get those shoes? And you just wore them before I did?!”

Sighing, Dojo held both claws up for silence. “Kids, kids, come on. We’re supposed to be apologizing to each other here.”

“And I will apologize”, Omi said, eagerly taking that opportunity. “You didn’t let me finish, Raimundo, I’m incredibly sorry I unboxed those shoes.”

“You’re doing my chores for a week”, Raimundo said, taking a calming breath. “I guess I’m sorry I lost my temper. And, Kimiko, I’m sorry again.”

At that, Kimiko shrugged. “I’m not that upset about diary thing. I never keep real details there anymore.”

“I’m apologizing because I asked Leon out”, he said, smiling despite himself. “Since we’re putting all our cards on the table and all. How’s that for piping hot coffee?”

Kimiko shrugged, though her lower lip lightly twitched in anger. “Whatever. Then I’m sorry I asked out Alessandra—sure beats you asking my two-week ex, doesn’t it?”

“This exercise is revealing some dark sides into our personalities”, Clay said, crossing his arms and nodding. “What was the point again, Dojo?”

Omi snapped his fingers. “Thank you, I feel like we were losing sight of what really mattered.”

“Are we?”, Raimundo said, sarcastically. “We discovered a clothes thief, crush-stealer, and Dumbass Detective over here. It’s a win.”

Kimiko smirked. “Let’s not go there. I’m already smiling and this should—and will—concern you after Dojo leaves.”

“Kids, please cut it out”, Dojo said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Please.”

That was not how he saw this argument playing out, not at all. Dojo honestly thought the kids would do their usual thing of taking issues mock-seriously until they made them a big joke and kept laughing about it till he left. It was what they usually did.

Sighing, Dojo tried again. “Okay, guys. Let’s start over. One apology each, doesn’t have to be directed to anyone.”

“Okay”, Omi said. “I’ll start because that’s the mature thing to do. I’m sorry I can be invasive and a ‘nosy bitch’ as you guys put it.”

Clay shrugged. “I’m sorry I was being too stubborn and accusatory for no reason.”

“I’m sorry”, Kimiko began. “That I let my anger go out of control and started this thing in the beginning. And I’m sorry I yelled too harshly at Omi.”

She paused sighing. “And I guess I’m sorry I asked out Alessandra, but like, only barely.”

“I understand”, Raimundo began, nodding. “I’m sorry I was out here giving bad help, hogging my shoes, and asking out other people’s exes. Now, are we good here?”

Dojo beamed brightly. “Yes, thank you! Exactly, this is what I wanted to see. Now kids, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to the Dragon Island reunion. See you later!”

As he floated up and out view but not out of earshot, Dojo heard a few yells and something along the lines of ‘_you bastard, yes, you better run_’. Sighing, the ancient dragon simply shrugged to himself and kept flying.

Master Fung could handle it from now. He could definitely manage.


	8. The College AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I got into details, but come on, who doesn't?

It all starts one day, seemingly out of the blue, this friendship, but both young men remember the day excruciatingly well. Then again, who wouldn’t have remembered that?

It had been Raimundo’s third day in China and he’d been already having regrets.

Going back to college a year after deciding to fuck it all because it wasn’t worth it was already nerve-wracking, but deciding to go back to college and start again in a different country a million—well, ten-thousand and three hundred and twenty-nine—miles away?

That was a _whole_ other can of worms and his parents, like anyone else’s parents, had thought he was going crazy or reaching a quarter-life crisis, while neither was the case.

See, Raimundo had just found this really cheap college abroad at a time where he needed an actual purpose but hadn’t decided one yet. So, he applied and got accepted and got his visa.

And now he was here, in line at the students’ affairs office, trying to see a possible route for his academic future. Well, he was about to, anyway.

As he reviewed his file one last time and went through the questions he had, Raimundo heard a loud argument erupt, catching his attention as well as everyone else’s.

“Look, squirt, I really don’t have the time, okay?”

“Neither do I, but a line is a line and I was here before you!”

Raimundo had shared a look with one of the other students in the waiting room before they both headed further down the hall, where the voices had come from.

When he got to the scene, Raimundo saw a dark-skinned Chinese guy and another paler-than-pale white guy—probably an American, if he got the entitlement right—standing nose to nose.

Well, nose to nose if they’d been the same height. The Chinese guy was unfortunately much shorter.

“Hey”, Raimundo began when the student he’d come with didn’t, “What’s going on here?”

The white boy sighed and gestured to him as if he finally saw someone with common sense.

“This twit won’t let me see my adviser.”

“_Because_”, the other guy retorted. “You passed me and I was ahead of you.”

“But I asked if I can pass you.”

“And I said no!”

“Look, kid, I’m preparing a master’s degree here so whatever undergrad bullshit you think you have—"

“O-kay”, Raimundo said, interrupting again. “Look, whit—what’s your name?”

“Jack”, the white redhead replied, confidently. “Jack Spicer.”

“Look, Jack, you asked if you can go ahead and the kid said no. It’s fairly simple, dude, wait your turn.”

Jack gave him a look. “I don’t think you understand, my thing’s actually important.”

“I’m sure his thing is important too”, Raimundo said, gesturing to the shorter guy.

Jack gave him a look and muttered something under his breath, which Raimundo couldn’t hear but just knew it was insulting.

“Hey, look, dude, just get in line and stop giving me more reasons to wedgie you.”

“Wedgie me?”, Jack repeated sarcastically. “This isn’t a high school parking lot.”

“It will be if you don’t get in fucking line, though.”

Jack gave Raimundo a look and followed it by a glare at the Chinese kid.

“Whatever”, he said, walking past them to the exit. “I have better options anyway, losers.”

After they watched Jack stomp away in anger, Raimundo and the other guy shared a look, followed by a laugh.

The Chinese kid began first. “Thank you for that…uh?”

“Raimundo.”

“Raimundo”, he said, nodding. “I’m Omi.”

“Cool name”, Raimundo said, fist-bumping the other’s fist. “You had it, you know, but you just let him get to you.”

Omi nodded, sighing. “I know, I know. Couldn’t help it really, nothing’s worse than entitled people.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I was trying to stay level-headed but this kind of people need someone who’s not afraid to get down to their level.”

Raimundo couldn’t tell if Omi was praising or insulting him. “Uh, thank you?”

“Oh”, Omi said sheepishly, the rest of his words catching up with him. “I didn’t mean it in a bad way—sometimes I say things without really thinking them through.”

“No kidding.”

Omi glared at him before breaking into a playful laugh, launching into a completely different topic, surprising and engaging Raimundo all at once with the way he moved from topic to topic with lightning speed.

* * *

As Raimundo slowly realized he was making his first friend in China, Kimiko was just about to meet hers and see, her story was completely different.

She’d already graduated college with flying colors, too, and went into the workforce to lead a relatively normal life. Not that the Tokyo tabloids would let her. Everyone in Japan was dedicated to their own craft and yellow journalists were no different.

It was kind of a bummer because Kimiko had hoped that video where she punched that other heiress in the face would’ve gone away and it had. But before that, it’d quickly gone viral and everyone wouldn’t leave her alone.

In the end, Tokyo had gotten so hectic and stifling for Kimiko, she just had to leave. Not that she knew what her course of action would be. After all, she had been working for her father before and he wouldn’t support her endeavors out of Japan, so she had to get creative.

So, instead of the plan being “_get the hell out of Tokyo and get away from everyone_”, it became “_get the hell out of Tokyo and away from everyone but do a master’s degree first so you’ll have support until you find a job_”.

And so far, the plan was going accordingly. Kimiko had found a decent university in nearby China so her family wouldn’t worry then found a nice enough apartment, though it wasn’t all that cool to live alone just yet.

As she entered the nearby bookstore, Kimiko had been thinking of putting out an ad for a new roommate. She’d also thought about specifying that they be cool and not a neat freak, but before she could think about it further, she spotted the book she’d come there for.

Unfortunately, someone else had the same thought.

“Excuse you”, Kimiko said in English, pleasantly. “Your hand is on my book.”

The other person, a man who very much looked and acted like a cowboy, squinted.

“I don’t see your name on it, miss”, he said. “In fact, the only name I see is—”

“Luz Gutierrez”, she finished. “Yeah, I know, and this is clearly the last copy so…”

“So finders keepers?”

“Great, and that would be me.”

“And me”, the cowboy said. “I reckon we touched it at the same time.”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “That’s physically impossible; this isn’t a Hallmark movie.”

“We could ask the cashier to review the security tapes, ma’am.”

“Oh my God, security tapes? It’s not a bank heist.”

“Then what can we do here?”, the cowboy said. “Because I’ve got a mind or two to read this novel.”

Kimiko nodded. “So do I.”

The two paused for a while, neither willing to let go of the book just yet. Until Kimiko snapped her fingers, like she finally got the golden ticket.

“I got it”, she said, triumphantly. “We can just share the book, can’t we? I’ll read it first then I’ll give it to you so you can read it too.”

The cowboy crossed his arms but nodded, impressed. “That…that’s actually a pretty good idea. I’m guessing you’ll need my number to call me?”

“Yup”, Kimiko said. “But just to be clear, I’m not hitting on you.”

“Thank God, then”, the cowboy said, taking out a mini-pen from his shirt pocket and writing his number on the book’s first page. “I’m not really into women.”

“I’ll remember that”, she said, taking a look at the number. “And I’ll call you soon, Clay Bailey.”

The cowboy smiled at that before shrugging off and leaving Kimiko off to head to the checkout counter, not that she needed any prompting.

She really wanted to read that book and read it she did. She read early in the morning over breakfast, in between classes, at the library when she got tired of studying, and whenever she had free time to hang out at the nearby tearoom.

Because she was a fast reader, Kimiko finished the book quickly, rather disappointed with the way everything came to be at the end. She was so disappointed she hadn’t really thought it through and immediately called Clay.

“Hi, Clay”, she began. “This is Kimiko—yes, Kimiko from the bookstore, yeah—okay, cool, if you want to have the book—yeah, I’m actually at the bookstore right now if you want it.”

The cowboy was free to meet her and did just that, though he kept saying she was probably exaggerating how bad the ending was and that the author just “_couldn’t write something that bad if she tried_”.

Two days later, though, Kimiko got a very disappointed-sounding call from a very downtrodden cowboy, who insisted they meet up somewhere. So, naturally, Kimiko suggested the tearoom she usually went to.

She’d arrived early that day, too, and greeted all those who were present, like she usually did. Clay arrived about an hour later, a little surprise at the place of choice.

“I mean it’s just so”, he began, struggling to find the word. “I don’t know, I expected you to pick a fancy café or something.”

Kimiko shrugged. “I give that impression off. This place is really cozy and the guests almost never change. Very homey, you know.”

She nodded at a far-right table where a redheaded lady and a short bald man sat, both in suits. “That’s Ms. Wuya and her assistant, Bean something—”

“Something?”, Clay asked.

“I never cared enough to remember”, Kimiko said. “They’re business-people. And those two are Guan and Chase. They’re this couple that run the dojo across the street.”

A pause, as they saw an old bald man walk hurriedly past them.

“_Ooh_, that’s Master Fung. He runs this tearoom, like really, he owns the place.”

Clay nodded. “Oh, that’s cool. And who’s that dude, with the red beard?”

“That’s Dojo”, Kimiko said, smiling and gesturing said man over. “This is my favorite waiter!”

Dojo gave her a look. “I’m the _only_ waiter. You’re getting the usual, I know, but what about you, newbie?”

“I’ll just take a jasmine”, Clay said, shrugging. “I need it. I’ve got things to tell you. Maria Andrea just didn’t deserve that horseshit ending.”

Kimiko nodded, leaned back, and the minute their order came, Clay began talking and didn’t stop for a long time. That actually became something of a thing in their friendship.

* * *

Every once in a while afterwards, Clay found himself calling Kimiko, one of his only friends in China, so they would meet up at the tearoom to talk for a few hours about their day and everything else they wanted to talk about. 

One day on one of their scheduled gab fests, Clay headed to the tearoom and saw Kimiko sitting in their usual spot. Only this time, she wasn’t alone. She had a good-looking, slightly familiar black guy with a fade next to hair, which kinda put Clay on the spot there.

“Clay”, Kimiko began, introducing the two. “This is Raimundo and Rai, this is Clay, the one I told you about.”

“Howdy, fella”, Clay began politely shaking the other man’s hand. “Pleasure to meet you. Are you two, like…?”

At that insinuation, the pair both scoffed, laughed, and waved it off. They were only friends but according to Kimiko, the way they met was too good to not be told and so she began telling it.

It’d been about a day after she gave the Disappointing Book to Clay, so she was already a little bored with all the free time. Kimiko thought the only way to get over that boredom was to call Keiko, her best friend back home, but sadly the girl hadn’t even picked up.

Deciding to make use of her time by exploring the nearby college campus, of which she so far only knew the library and her classrooms.

On that first walk, though, Kimiko decided to bring with her the travel mug she brought everywhere and filled it to the brim with coffee, taking a few sips on the way.

That turned out to be a bad idea, though, because while she was not looking, she’d rammed into someone, face-first, mug-first and coffee went everywhere, miraculously scorching no one.

To an objective point of view, both people were at fault. She wasn’t really looking where she was going, assuming her path was clear, and he was in such a hurry he hadn’t bothered to switch walking lanes.

Speaking objectively and apologizing and just walking away wasn’t nearly close to what those two would have done, though. Instead, they began fighting almost immediately.

“Can you maybe watch where you’re going”, Kimiko began, sharply. “You have any idea how difficult it would be to wash coffee out of this? This is _silk_!”

Raimundo gave her a look. “Well, who walks around dressed in silks on campus? The Empress of Japan? Girl, fuck off, you should have watched out for your coffee!”

Glaring and not even close to backing down, Kimiko crossed her arms and began zeroing in on the enemy’s weaknesses for an insult. Fortunately, though, she never got past the shirt.

“Is that a”, she began, not really comprehending what she saw. “Is that a Uhura shirt?”

“Yeah”, he said, crossing his arms now. “And before you call me a nerd or anything, Uhura changed the game and—”

“I wasn’t, uh, I actually really like Uhura.”

“…You a trekkie, by any chance?”

“Massively, yeah”, Kimiko admitted, sincerely. “I may not go around calling myself one, though, it really attracts the nerds.”

Raimundo nodded. “No, I totally get it. I never talk about Star Trek unless I’m sure I won’t get a hit to my reputation.”

After a pause, Kimiko allowed him a small smile. “So, what’s your favorite episode?”

“The City on the Edge of Forever, that one’s a classic, you know.”

“I _know_, mine’s the Balance of Terror.”

“Oh, with the Romulans and shit”, Raimundo said, smiling. “That one was really well-done, like you’d never think—”

“I know, right?”, Kimiko said, unable to help herself. “And that episode where the Klingons were—God, by the way, I _love_ Klingons, like I really do.”

“Well, who doesn’t, like—”

“No, I meant, like, I loved the character—and the story arcs—so much I actually learned Klingon, like I’m really fluent in the language.”

“You’re kidding”, Raimundo said, smile getting even bigger. “Me too!”

“No fucking way!”

“Yes fucking way, actually.”

* * *

When he'd heard that was how another, would-be-lifelong friendship was made, Clay had really wanted to judge both Kimiko and Raimundo because, well, that story sort of invited it. But then again, it turned out, he didn’t have the best track record with “meeting friends” stories himself.

See, Raimundo had then told him they met up before, very irregularly too. He didn’t know if the cowboy remembered but he, personally, will never forget that night.

Raimundo had been at a library, studying or something or the other, and had just decided that okay, maybe an all-nighter was going to work. It wasn’t, however, going to work without any alcohol in his system, so he’d gone out, bought vodka, and refilled his water bottles with it.

It’d been about an hour into the night when Raimundo heard a strange sound coming nearer and nearer in the aisle behind his table. Curiously, he’d gotten up and took a look through the books.

The sight he saw wasn’t really computing well, though. Raimundo had just seen a cowboy, yes, a _real_ cowboy with the boots and hat and everything but that…that couldn’t be right, could it?

“I shouldn’t have bought the vodka”, he whispered to himself when he sat back down, blinking and drinking some actual water to sober up. “Why am I hallucinating cowboys, what kind of sick brain—”

“Uh, sir?”

At that, Raimundo turned and gave the inquirer a look. And surely enough, it was the cowboy, standing and giving him a worried look.

“Are you okay?”, Clay had asked, concernedly. “You’re muttering to yourself.”

Raimundo gave him a pleasant smile. “I’m drunk!”

He paused.

“Are you real?”

“Uh, why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because”, Raimundo said, as if it should be obvious. “You look like you belong in an old-timey western. Like, not one of the good ones.”

“I’ll take it”, Clay said. “Only because you’re drunk. So, now for the hard questions—why are you getting drunk in the library?”

“I study better when I’m drunk”, Raimundo explained. “I know it sounds stupid but it really works. And I really need the grades, you know.”

“Well, I’m not one to judge—”

“Thank you.”

“—but I will anyway. You know you’ll need to eat something, right?”

“I had like two bowls of ramen before I came here, I’m good.”

“No, you’re really not. It’s actually kind of worrying me to the point where I think I need to stay here in case you blackout.”

“I won’t”, Raimundo said. “But fine, I might need the company. Come, sit, man who I’m sure is a figment of my sick imagination.”

Clay scoffed. “Okay. So…whatchu’ studying there?”

“Media law and ethics. I took this subject before and I told them but I guess they just didn’t get the memo. I really don’t know how college transcripts work, but okay I guess.”

“Oh, you transferred?”

“Yeah, from Rio. Like, Brazil Rio.”

“That’s cool, I’m from Texas, like—”

“I know where that is”, Raimundo said, cutting him off. “I don’t get why you’re here, though. I thought the U.S had great colleges.”

“They do”, Clay said. “And I can afford it, I guess, but I just didn’t want to, you know. It was about time I took on a new adventure, see what’s out there.”

“I feel you, I wanted the same thing so when I decided to go back to college after I dropped out I thought about somewhere—”

“Wait, you dropped out?”

“Yeah, keep up. Anyways, I thought about going somewhere far and there was China, you know”, Raimundo said, before quickly realizing the other man needed more answers. “I was going through a really rough patch. Like, dye-my-hear-an-outrageous-color-for-no-reason rough patch.”

Clay sputtered a little before nodding. “It’s great you found your way back then. Like, to a new life. I thought about dropping out once or twice myself but I never had the courage to follow through. And here I am, doing a master’s to work on something I don’t like.”

“Which is?”

“My family’s ranch.”

“Yeah, I really don’t want to pigeonhole you and shit”, Raimundo said, smirking. “But you’re making it really hard, just so you know.”

Clay shrugged, smiling. “It is what it is, I guess.”

The rest of the night pretty much fell into that pattern. Clay would say something, Raimundo would respond and go back to his notes, then he would say something and the cowboy would reply and so on.

It was an easy conversation about dreams and majors and work, interesting too, and both men might have wanted to pick up where it left off several times. Sadly, they’d never asked for each other’s names, not once.

* * *

One day after the surprisingly fun and interesting hangout at the tearoom with the three recent friends, Raimundo swung by Kimiko’s place to return this skin cream he’d borrowed.

Surprisingly, she wasn’t alone. As he came closer to the ajar apartment door, Raimundo heard her talk to someone else, a man, and got very curious and also very dickhead-y.

Now was the perfect time to make a few dirty jokes when they were so not needed.

“Hey, Kim”, Raimundo said, barging in with a huge grin on his face. “I never thought I’d—Omi?”

Said man was just as surprised. “Raimundo? What are you doing here?”

“I’m guessing”, Kimiko said, looking between the two with minimal confusion. “You two have met before.”

“Yeah”, Omi said. “At the students’ affairs office, I almost got into a fight but he stopped it.”

She shot the other man a surprised look. “Really now? That’s cool, so like are you friends?”

“Well, yeah”, Raimundo was saying just as Omi snorted and said, “I thought so!”

The made for an interesting surprise. “What are you talking about, man?”

“You said we’d hang out”, Omi explained. “And yet this is like the third time I’ve seen you all semester, so 'friends' is questionable, don’t you think?”

Raimundo scratched his jaw. “Yeah, I guess it makes sense. If you’re going to be rooming with Kim, though, we’re definitely going to stay friends. I’m here a lot.”

Before Omi could say anything, Kimiko interrupted with a raised eyebrow.

“Hold on, hold on”, she said. “Room with Kim? I’m still interviewing him, there’s no guarantee he’ll be my roommate.”

A pause. “And in fact, the interview process is secret so give me my coconut face cream and get out!”

Three minutes after the grumbling man left the apartment, muttering all about how un-fun and stuck up everyone was getting these days, Kimiko turned to the possible candidate with a smile.

That kind of worried Omi because, well, he didn’t really think they got on the right start.

See, the first thing Kimiko had said to him when he opened the door was that she thought he was a girl because she misread the name on the application.

Naturally, he immediately told her she should have paid actual attention and that she hadn’t really specified who she wanted to room with, which got him a chilling glare but no reply, mostly because Raimundo chose that moment to barge in.

So, now all Kimiko knew about Omi was that he was rude, had a really harsh tone, and that he occasionally got in fights…which wasn’t really good.

“I should leave now and spare us all the bullshit, right?”, Omi said, shrugging. “You’re never going to want me for a roommate.”

Kimiko shrugged. “Who said that?”

“Well, we’re not getting off to a good start, you know.”

“So? I’ve been told that I was a straight up asshole on the first impression and I’ve gotten into my fair share of fights. No big deal.”

“So, you’d take me in?”

“Well, no”, Kimiko said, squinting. “It’s not a shelter, you know, but yes, I might accept your application if you pass the test.”

“Test?”, Omi said, a little caught off-guard. “I didn’t study and—”

“Relax”, she said. “So, say we have a party or a get-together and there are a ton of dishes in the sink. Who cleans them?”

He shrugged. “Ideally, we’d have a daily turn system for the chores, but if there isn’t then the one who cleans it up is the one who threw the party in the first place.”

“Okay, and when the toilet-paper roll in the bathroom runs out…”

“The person who uses the last paper is the one who replaces it. Next question.”

“I’m out partying and I won’t be home for a very long time. Do you go in my room?”

“No.”

“I can tell you’re lying”, Kimiko said, hands on her hips. “I have a built-in bullshit detector.”

“Okay, fine”, Omi said, groaning. “I’d go in to take a look but I won’t touch anything.”

She rolled her eyes. “Last question. I come home, drunk off my rocker, about to throw up and make a mess everywhere. What do you do?”

“I’ll take you to the bathroom, drag you there if I must”, he said, nodding. “Hold you hair as you throw up, then help you lay down. Then I’ll make you some tea and _congee_ so your stomach would settle.”

“Great”, Kimiko said, clapping her hands once. “You can move in tomorrow.”

Omi sighed, relieved. “Great. I’m really happy I got this spot, it’s really close to campus and I cannot stand dorms.”

“Tell me about it!”

* * *

Naturally, these friendship ties grew only stronger when Omi and Clay eventually meet the day Raimundo brings Omi to a movie he was seeing with the cowboy. Omi hadn’t wanted to come because he felt he’d be invasive but Raimundo told him he was being stupid.

“I resent you invalidating my feelings like that”, Omi said, glaring.

Raimundo snorted and mimicked the way the younger man spoke. “Look, dude, you’re my friend and you’re Kimiko’s friend and roommate and we’re both friends with Clay, so you’re going to run into him eventually.”

“I’d have love to have seen him organically, though, like—”

“Organically my ass! You don’t speak unless you’re forced to and I do not want to have these nightmares about Clay coming over to your place and seeing only you there and have you two talk about the weather, alright?”

Omi huffed. “Alright, you made your point but if we don’t mesh well together, I’m leaving.”

“Fine but you have to fucking try, okay?”

And try Omi did. The first time he’d seen Clay that night, he’d felt incredibly awkward that he hadn’t known what to talk about and ended up saying about two words to him the entire night.

They shared almost no similarities, at least up until the gang was all hanging out and Omi mentioned he was taking some self-defense classes at the dojo across the tearoom.

“That’s a really great idea, partner”, Clay said. “I was actually thinking about going there myself. I’d done some Tai Chi growing up and I’d love to go back to it again.”

Omi found that surprising. “I trained too as a child. Choy Li Fut—I was a prodigy.”

“Oh, that’s very cool sounding”, the cowboy said. “I’ll definitely love it if show me some forms some time. Maybe when we hit up that dojo, you know.”

“Oh…okay, I’d really love that. Maybe we’ll get tea afterwards too.”

“That’d be a treat! They have these little crystal cakes and I swear I’ve never tasted anything that good.”

“Well, I doubt they’d top my mother’s crystal cakes, see she does them with—”

Seeing the burgeoning development, a grinning Raimundo leaned into Kimiko and whispered.

“Is this a bad time to tell them we’re into martial arts too? Like, it’s not just a them-thing?”

“Dude, let them bond for fuck’s sake”, she whispered back. “But isn’t it really weird we’re like this Street Fighter gang?”

“I _know_!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate American college AUs, fyi. Like, all the characters are already China-based in the actual thing, why not use that?
> 
> (might get a part 2, but that's a light 'might')


	9. Brotherhood and Football

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What do you get when you put two brother-figures and some sports? Bonding

As Omi swiveled and jogged through the crowded London streets, he couldn’t help but thinking that maybe he could have taken a rain check when Raimundo asked him if he wanted to go to the game.

For one thing, he hadn’t really known what he was agreeing to, but he’d said yes anyway because, well, what was the worst that could happen?

Usually whenever Raimundo talked about a game and asked if someone wanted to tag along, he meant that he was going to play football for money in the park in the next town over.

It wasn’t the case this time, apparently. Raimundo was actually asking if someone wanted to go to an actual game in an actual stadium. Sadly, Omi hadn’t heard that last part.

“Come on”, Raimundo said, shivering at the cold in his long-sleeved Arsenal shirt. “We need to get to the good seats.”

“If you mention the seats one more time, I swear to Dashi, you’ll regret it”, Omi said, tagging along.

Truth was Omi wasn’t at all bothered by the cold, like Raimundo was. He was rather warm and toasty in Raimundo’s jacket, which the latter insisted he’d wear because the boy had the audacity to wear a blue shirt.

“And?”, he’d asked then. “It’s just a color.”

Raimundo had side-eyed him. “It’s not just a color when we’re literally going to be playing _Chelsea_. Are you insane?”

Though he still hadn’t understood what the big deal was, Omi had nodded and pretended like he did, simply to make his friend shut up.

“How much longer?”, Omi asked, a tad whiningly. “It’s a stadium, Rai, it shouldn’t take us this long to—never mind.”

Raimundo gave his friend a victorious look as they finally reached the stadium.

“I told you I know my shortcuts”, he said, smirking. “Now, follow my lead.”

Omi nodded and followed his older friend as they made their way through the crowds to the line leading to the inside. Raimundo gave the security their tickets, _definitely_ not brought off a black market in China for an astoundingly cheap price, and waited.

Holding his breath, Omi waited too before exhaling as they were allowed through the gates.

“I can’t believe that worked”, he said, nudging Raimundo as he walked. “I honestly believed we’d get arrested.”

Raimundo snorted, holding his fist out for Omi to bump it. “Same here.”

Those words were probably the last coherent words Raimundo had said all night, if Omi remembered correctly. The next five hours, all in all, were plain hellish.

For one thing, Omi had to collect Raimundo off the displays, which was predictable, and other fans and rivals, which wasn’t. Apparently putting a naturally conversational person with a never-ending conversation topic, like football, was a code for disaster.

“Fuck you, Christopher”, Raimundo had yelled at one Chelsea fan before Omi could drag him away. “You’ll eat dirt today, asshole, just like your mother was eating m—"

“Dude”, Omi said, after they walked away together. “Was that last comment really necessary? That was too deep.”

Raimundo nodded. “Yes, it was. I’m not proud of it, but it was.”

“You’re lying”, the younger boy said, detecting his friend’s small smirk. “You really are way up your own ass, aren’t you?”

“_Someone_ has to gas me up, if you won’t.”

That wasn’t all, of course.

As they’d taken their seats with the hardcore fans, as Raimundo called them, Omi decided he was going to loosen up and enjoy himself. After all, he’d never been in a stadium before and sure, he had seen games but wouldn’t experiencing it be something magi—

“_Pipoqueiro_!”, Raimundo was yelling in the loudest, angriest voice Omi had ever heard. “Get off and let a real player on, you cu—”

Tuning his friend out, Omi tried to focus on the actual game. It wasn’t going well, apparently, from what he’d seen and aggressively heard. A small sigh caught his attention.

“Don’t worry”, a little girl with afro puffs told him. “I come here with my dad every weekend and it’s always like this. They’ll calm down the minute they get a goal.”

Omi took a look at the pitch and back to the little girl. “Will they, though?”

“To be honest, I don’t think they will”, the girl said, apologetically. “Arsenal are having a bad spell.”

A bad spell was a kind way to put, Omi thought but didn’t say. Right now, the scoreboard made him a little too embarrassed that he actively thought about taking off the jacket to show the blue sweater and distance himself from this mess.

As if reading his mind, Raimundo turned to him with a glare. “Do _not_ even think about it. Not even your element will save you here.”

“I wasn’t going to do anything”, Omi protested, pouting a little.

So the younger boy kept his jacket on and tried to will himself to cheer on a team of losers, not that he could say anything about that out loud. That was bit dangerous here.

It would be also dangerous while they walked out of the stadium. Dangerous while they took the bus and dangerous while they waited aimlessly in the street.

Omi, though, was getting fed up with all the danger. “Are we gonna do something or are you gonna mope around for the rest of the day?”

“I’m not moping”, Raimundo said. “I’m mourning.”

“Who died?”, Omi said. “Wait, wait, let me guess, your respect for that Mustafi guy?”

Raimundo clicked his tongue. “That died a long time ago. Today, we’re mourning my self-respect and dignity because I said I won’t go back to this stinky-ass team and I keep doing that.”

He paused, sighing more to himself than anything.

“This is the most toxic relationship I’ve ever been in. I just never learn, you know. I keep thinking they’ve learned from their mistakes and that they’ll actually give it everything they’ve got but guess what?”

Omi didn’t have any time for guessing games. “They keep disappointing you, but you’ll probably keep going back because they’re still your team in the end.”

“You know it”, Raimundo agreed. “Between them and Flamengo in Rio, I think these teams are going to have me on hypertension pills before I’m twenty.”

Omi nodded and pointed a finger. “This is why I’m not into sports.”

“You’re not into sports because you’re a fucking nerd”, the older boy said, though it didn’t make any sense. “If I didn’t see you in action, I wouldn’t have thought you had an athletic bone in your body.”

The other boy glared. “I’m much more athletic than you are! I’ve been training since I was a—”

“A chubby baby in diapers”, Raimundo said, rolling his eyes. “I know, I know.”

Omi huffed. “I’m still better than you.”

“Yes, but who’s the actual emotional jock here?”, the Brazilian boy said, fixing a few hairs in his fade. “Oh yeah, it’s me. And by the way, girls love that shit.”

“I don’t care for girls like that”, the Chinese boy said, scoffing.

“I know; boys too.”

Sighing, the other boy crossed his arms, defensively. Raimundo did have a point every once in a while and apparently, this was one of those times.

There was also a lot of evidence to back up his stories, just this once. Omi did remember a cute guy or two giving his friend their numbers just because he’d been in a football jersey.

“Fine then”, Omi said, caving in. “Teach me all about being a jock, O' Wise One!”

Raimundo crossed his arms. “I resent that tone but fine. Here’s your first lesson.”

Omi followed Raimundo with his eyes as the latter gave a little sprint and kicked a crushed soda can over an impressive distance. As he walked back, Raimundo smiled, smugly.

“Never miss a chance to show off.”

“Noted”, the younger boy said, rolling his eyes. “Now, can I get some real tips?”

Raimundo snorted. “That was a real tip.”

Seeing that his older friend was continuing to walk and was getting further and further away, Omi hurried up to catch him, giving him a curious look.

“Where are we going?”

“The football cages”, Raimundo explained.

“I’m sorry”, Omi began. “The what?”

* * *

The football cages were a much nicer place than the name suggested to Omi. It was actually a collection of a couple of football courts, each court surrounded and closed off by chained fences.

“So, what are we learning today?”

“You”, Raimundo began. “Will try to nutmeg me.”

Omi raised his eyebrows. “Isn’t that like a total humiliation in football, though?”

“Keyword here is _try_, Big Head”, the older boy said. “It’s pretty cool, you know, so that’s always a point.”

As soon as he’d said that, Raimundo took his sweater off, preferring to stay in another thin long-sleeved shirt he’d worn under it. Scowling at the nickname, Omi took the jacket off and tied it around his waist, a determined expression on his face.

And try Omi did. After a while of running around simply trying to take the ball off Raimundo, the younger boy was sure he’d been the one who was nutmegged about half a dozen times.

“Will you stop doing that?”, Omi screeched, as his friend ran circles around him.

Raimundo blew a raspberry. “Remember rule number one, little boy.”

“Who are you calling little?”, Omi asked, finally taking the ball off his gloating friend. “I’m going to win!”

Thirty minutes—and about thirty-four nutmegs from Raimundo later—Omi finally did win and managed to pass the ball through his unassuming friend’s legs. No, it hadn’t hurt him that he was yawning.

“We’re eating”, Omi said, a little demanding. “I could go for some of those veggie burgers we saw today.”

Raimundo nodded. “Yeah, the lettuce sandwiches at the shop with the thing. I remember those. I could go for some chicken too.”

* * *

Though it only took them ten minutes to walk to the little diner they mentioned, both boys’ bones ached so horribly those ten minutes felt like ten years. Each for different reasons.

Omi sat on his chair and massaged his calves, which were definitely going to hurt more in the morning than right now. “I should _not_ have gotten that competitive.”

“God, you’re right”, Raimundo said, flopping on his chair after they gave the cashier their orders. “Even my abs hurt from all the laughing.”

Smirking, Omi wasn’t bothered. “Mock me all you want, but I defeated you in the end.”

“Well, I defeated you every five seconds”, the older boy said. “Trust me, I’m not complaining.”

“Arrogant asshole”, the other muttered in Mandarin, as the waiter set down the food. “Always showing off.”

Raimundo smirked. “Cute. You think trash-talking me in another language is going to fuck with me? I invented that move.”

“No, you didn’t”, Omi said, tiredly. “Shut up and eat your dead, tortured poultry.”

“Watch it, this is a cruelty-free place”, the other boy said. “And anything I bite into is actually worth paying for because it doesn’t grow in our garden.”

“We can’t grow everything, Raimundo. Even you know that.”

“Eat your lettuce before it gets cold, Big Head!”

“Stop saying that!”

Clicking his tongue, Omi bit into his veggie burger and took a look at the TV.

There was nothing special on, so the diner owner was flicking through channels and settled on a sports channel that showed none other than the highlights of today’s Arsenal match.

Raimundo sighed, the tired resignation he’d had post-game reappearing again. Omi didn’t think it was serious until a tall, tattooed brown boy with undercut passed by and his friend hadn’t so much as turned.

“Are you okay?”, Omi asked, concernedly.

The older boy shrugged. “Yeah, it’s just—look, like that was such an easy shot but of course, Auba had to miss it.”

He paused. “We’d be lucky if we made it sixth this year.”

“Careful not to jinx yourself”, Omi said, a little too late. “By the way, that guy was checking you out.”

Other than nodding at the cute stranger his friend had noticed earlier, Raimundo made no more effort to do anything else.

“I’m not in the mood for”, he explained. “For anything actually.”

Omi made a gesture. “I noticed. You didn’t even try to flirt with the waitress to get free appetizers like always.”

“O, when we go home after a debilitating battle we lost against the forces of evil”, Raimundo began, as one does. “Do you feel like you’re in the mood for anything other than sleep for like eighty years?”

“No…”

“It’s the same with football.”

He paused, chuckling a little. “It’s actually funny. My siblings and I had this little tradition called Depression Tuesday. Every time Flamengo, our home team, lost, we’d sneak beer from the spot my mom hid them and we’d just drink up.”

Raimundo laughed, then stopped himself, difficulty to explain.

“When I was younger, only my older siblings drank, but I did get a lot of soda and I wasn’t allowed”, he said. “Now when our team loses and I’m home, my brother Jacinto and I split a bottle.”

Omi chuckled at that. “It’s weird that it’s always a Tuesday, though.”

“It’s not actually, but the name stuck. My sister Marta came up with it, so you know.”

Another sibling name-dropped in one minute, Omi thought, trying to not let it get to him. Somewhere along the line, he’d been getting slowly fed up with one specific friend mentioning things like that to him.

It was all rather weird actually because Omi had always loved hearing about his friends’ families before. Clay grew up in a ranch, Kimiko semi-grew up in a business empire, and Raimundo grew up in a circus. Excuse him if the curiosity never faded.

As the three mentioned more and more of their cousins, like Kimiko always did, or siblings, like Clay always did, Omi got more curious. Their stories tended to be too fun to miss.

He wasn’t annoyed with those two. Oh no. Nothing ever annoyed Omi more than when Raimundo especially spoke because he always had to add unnecessary peppering.

See, his friend would always mention his cousins like he would regular people, but when it came to siblings, it was always ‘_my brother so-and-so_’ or ‘_my sister so-and-so_’.

Since Raimundo always spoke about his siblings, that meant Omi had to hear these words almost too much for a normal person, which irked him.

“Let’s talk about something”, Omi said, noticing the lack of conversation when he came back to reality. “What’s on your mind that isn’t sports right now?”

Raimundo pursed his lips. “Right now, I’m thinking about how I can get out of chores tomorrow.”

“Seriously?”

“Nah. I’m actually thinking about those shoes we saw at the Adidas shop across the street.”

“I saw them too”, Omi said. “Those were cool.”

Raimundo nodded. “They know what they’re doing. Plus, all that marketing shit keeps getting into our heads so we’re always impressed.”

As they hit another pause, Omi thought of a new question to ask Raimundo. Well, it wasn’t exactly new but he’d never gotten around to asking it really.

“How many cities have you been to, by the way?”

“This is not a weird turn or anything”, Raimundo said, sarcastically. “But sure. Can’t we do countries?”

“No”, Omi said. “That’s a cheap shot. And no cities we visited on Wu missions either!”

“Way to make it difficult”, the other boy said. “Okay, so pre-temple, I’ve been to like twenty-seven, maybe twenty-eight countries. Let’s see.”

Raimundo silently mouthed the countries, nodding to himself.

“Right, it’s twenty-seven”, he said. “Anyway. I’ve been to Santa Catarina—of course—Buenos Aires, Montevideo, Cardiff, Bogota, Medellin, Minsk, La Paz—”

“Where’s that?”, Omi asked, curious at the unfamiliar city name.

“Bolivia”, Raimundo said. “I’ve also been to Ankara, Tunis, Luanda, Barcelona, Madrid, Seville—basically every Spanish city. I guess Marseille counts. We stayed for like two hours so we didn’t get to do anything.”

He paused, looking at the ceiling hoping to find inspiration.

“Can I stop? My brain is literally melting trying to remember.”

“Cool”, Omi said, shrugging. “I got another question for you, is there a city you want to visit still?”

“Paris”, Raimundo said, instantly. “People say it’s disgusting as fuck but I need to go. The one time my circus got to go I had the flu so I was a hazard risk and they didn’t take me.”

Omi made a face. “That sucks.”

“I know”, the other boy said. “You’ve been asking all the questions, though.”

“Oh, you can ask me too.”

“I wasn’t taking your permission but okay”, Raimundo said. “You ever been out of China before we started going on Wu missions?”

Omi shook his head. “No, not—well, I suppose we did go to Tibet that one time.”

“Oh cool”, Raimundo said. “My grandmother on my dad’s side is half-Tibetan.”

He paused. “She’s also half-Japanese. Full gringa, though. Came to Brazil with—”

“Nothing but the hair on her eyebrows”, Omi finished. “Her words, not yours, I know.”

“Weird. I don’t remember telling you that.”

“You were high at the time”, Omi explained. “Maybe that’s a factor.”

Raimundo nodded. “Maybe. So, how was Tibet?”

Omi shrugged and began explaining what he and Master Fung were doing at the Xiaolin event that took them to Tibet.

Despite intending it to be a minute-long story, Omi ended up rambling here and there. He stopped eventually. About fifteen minutes later.

“—and the Lama accidentally set the entire car on fire”, he was saying, as he finished the story. “So, that was an interesting few days. I did get some burns, but they’re all healed now so yeah, worth it!”

“Those Tibetan monks sound more fun than ours”, Raimundo said in an understatement.

Omi snorted. “Tell me about it.”

“_Shit_, we should get going”, the other boy said, taking a look at his phone’s watch. “Master Fung’s going to ground us until we age into our next lives.”

The younger boy blanched. “It’s that late?”

“Yeah”, Raimundo said, getting up. He handed Omi a few bills and gestured to the cashier. “I’m gonna go start the Silver Manta Ray in the empty alleyway we talked about. Pay the man and follow me.”

Nodding, Omi grabbed the money and went to the cashier, who greeted him with a smile and nod and the bill up front.

“Here you go, lad”, the cashier said, handing Omi the change. “Off you go now.”

Omi almost bowed but held himself off. “Thank you, sir. Good night.”

As he walked away, Omi heard a sentence from that man that, well, changed his night completely. The cashier probably hadn’t meant it—or if he did, then he was doing it in a funny way—but he’d said it all the same.

“Lad, take it easy on your brother, would you?”, the man had said. “He’s having a tough time. All gunners are this season. Club’s going through shit.”

Nodding, Omi hurried out the diner, a wide smile on his face.

Did everyone who saw him and Raimundo think they were brothers? They didn’t share any similarity except that when it was sunny out, Omi got as dark as Raimundo was at times. That was it, surely.

Omi reached the alleyway, where Raimundo had already set up the Manta Ray. His friend was too busy scrolling through his phone, so he hadn’t noticed him.

Other than the different skin tones that sometimes aligned, Omi saw that he and Raimundo might have shared the same face shape and the curls. Well, the curls if Omi had grown his hair out, but it was still something.

Their jawlines, too, were similar. Sure, his friend’s was more defined now, but Omi was getting there. He found that it was really hard caring about curls or jawlines now, however.

Many people probably _did_ think they were brothers.

Some because of the similarities Omi had discovered and others because they might have noticed the way both boys acted with each other.

There were also some who definitely just thought it because they were racists who thought every brown person was related to the next, but Omi shook them out of his head for now.

Knowing his friend, Raimundo would laugh about the incident with the cashier but he’d probably add that to his vocabulary. One day Omi might even hear him introduce him to others as his brother Omi.

Unsurprisingly, Omi didn’t mind that at all. Brother was such a little word, he knew, but it meant a lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Raimundo's a long-suffering gunner (aka Arsenal fan) and I know some of them irl, their misery is hilarious  
-Chelsea wear blue  
-Omi doesn't understand and doesn't give two shits  
-Pipoqueiro is a football player who doesn't doesn’t play well in important games


	10. Kimiko and Clay Do Facials

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chore-free, evil-free day plus two gossiping teens and some facials

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lost half of this by accident, still good though

Today was a quiet day in the Xiaolin temple. Training was done and so were the chores, so the teenagers were all free to do whatever it was that they wanted.

Raimundo and Omi went to a football game, Kimiko was nowhere to be seen, so Clay decided to do something he’d never done. He started sunbathing. Yes, he was going to use his free time to do something new.

Currently, Clay was on the roof where he was sure he’d get the best sun and the most silence.

Naturally, that had to be interrupted.

“_Clayton_!”

Grimacing, Clay put his previously discarded top robe on and scooched over to allow Kimiko room to sit by him. Usually he’d have been happy to see her, but he just wished she’d stop it with the nickname.

Actually, he wished they’d all stop with that. Sadly, Jessie had made sure that won’t be the case when she first introduced the inside joke.

“Kimberly”, Clay said, with the same cheery tone.

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “Classic white man move, dude.”

She paused, giving him a cheeky look. “So…”

“So?”, Clay asked warily. “What is it?”

“Nothing. Uh, we don’t have anything to do.”

“Yup, that’s pretty much certain.”

“And it’s only us, technically.”

“Technically. _So_?”

Grinning openly now, Kimiko took out a jar she had in the small purse she had by her side.

“So, I got us a couple of face masks we’re going to try!”

“That ain’t gonna happen”, Clay said, matter-of-factly. “You know I don’t do face masks.”

Kimiko pouted. “Come on, cowboy, you need this far more than I do.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means”, she said, seriously. “Your pores are huge.”

Scoffing, Clay turned to face the sun again. This was an age-old argument he’d always had with one Dragon specifically. It just wasn’t this one.

“You sound like Raimundo”, he said. “Did he put you up to this?”

Kimiko shrugged. “No, but we did spend a lot of time yesterday trash-talking your lack of a skin care routine so…”

“So you’re taking pity on me”, Clay said, understanding. “That’s it.”

She nodded. “Pretty much, yeah. You in?”

“Do I have an actual choice?”, he asked.

“Like, no, but it’s common courtesy to ask.”

* * *

Back in the Dragons’ room, Clay and Kimiko sat in the latter’s room with an array of face masks before them. Though he was bored out of his mind, Clay pretended to be interested because it clearly was something to Kimiko.

“I don’t know”, she said finally. “I feel like most of these would get an allergic reaction from you.”

The cowboy shrugged. “I’m only allergic to mango, though.”

“Oh right”, Kimiko said, remembering. “Gods, what a sad life you must lead if you don’t get to enjoy fruit.”

Clay resented that. “I can enjoy fruit, just not all of it. What about you? You can’t enjoy dairy products.”

“Fuck dairy products”, she said, not at all bothered. “Besides, I’m lactose intolerant, you’re really coming for the only thing that you know I won’t be bothered by? Really?”

To that, a smug Clay had one word. “Ice-cream.”

“Damn”, Kimiko said after a beat. “You’re right.”

Chuckling, Clay leaned back into his pillow as Kimiko finally chose a face mask for him. From what he could tell, it was raspberry mixed with something else. Opening the bottle, the girl took a dollop of the cream and started spreading it over her friend’s face.

“Kim”, Clay said, more than a little uncomfortable. “Personal space?”

“That doesn’t exist in skin care”, Kimiko said, focusing on the cream. “And before you ask, no, you can’t do it. Your fingers are dirty.”

“Oh, how d’you figure that out, Ms. Sherlock?”

“You didn’t wash them when we came down from the roof, genius.”

After she was done, Kimiko started on her own face mask. While she was humming contently, Clay tried to find anything to focus on to avoid itching his nose.

“Jeez, Kim”, the cowboy said, as Kimiko handed him two cucumber slices. “Do these even work?”

Kimiko rolled her eyes. “I’m not dignifying that with an answer.”

Chuckling, Clay took a look at his phone to see a new message from Omi. It was a serious of straight-line-faced emojis.

“What do you think Rai and Omi are doing at that match, though?”, he asked, after showing her message.

Kimiko shrugged. “Knowing both of them, Raimundo is probably picking like three thousand fights and Omi’s trying to pretend like he doesn’t know him.”

“I guess that’s close”, Clay said. “I wouldn’t like to be with either of those two at a sports’ game.”

He paused. “Or with you at a Black Friday sale. I still get chills every time I think about that day.”

Kimiko shrugged. “You know what they say, Clayton, women be shopping.”

“Nice one”, the cowboy allowed. “You know something? I thought I’d be more comfortable as time went on, but I’m really not.”

“That’s because you’re such a Mr. Cal.”

Scrunching his face, Clay waited for an explanation that never came. “What?”

“You know, like, a Mr. Cal”, Kimiko said, giggling a little. “First name Typi.”

Clay made a face. “That wasn’t as funny as you probably think it was.”

“That’s only because my humor is too advanced for you”, she said. “And don’t derail the subject, dude. Why do you have to be so macho, it’s _so_ 2007.”

The cowboy side-eyed his friend, trying to figure out if she was joking or not. When she didn’t say anything, Clay finally answered.

“Because I’m gay”, he said. “That comes with a lot of stereotypes and stuff and like Texas—well, home’s becoming a lot more accepting now but there are still jokers and homophobes.”

He paused. “I don’t try to put an act on or anything but if I’m too macho, well, no one’s that bothered by it there.”

“You know”, Kimiko said. “I’m gay too. _And_ I’m Japanese. _And_ I’m a girl.”

She paused. “That comes with a whole set of rules too, but like, I don’t try to hide—like, I know it’s different for everyone and stuff but why…do you get what I want to say?”

“I do”, Clay said, understanding her point. “I just think it’s a matter of comfort and confidence, you know. Like, Kim, you’re much more confident than I am.”

Kimiko nodded. “Not all the time. It can be too scary at times.”

“I get it”, the cowboy said. “To progress, I guess.”

The girl nodded. “To progress.”

“Now, can we talk about something light please?”, Clay asked with a small smile. “We need to diffuse this cloud.”

Kimiko tilted her head. “We can talk about boys.”

“I thought you said they’re all the same”, the cowboy said. “Also, that they’re all and I quote ‘trash’?”

“They are and I love bitching about it. So, you start.”

So Clay did start and began speaking about a recent blind date Patrick had set him up on and the disaster it led to. Then Kimiko followed with a few stories of her own, deviating to mention a few date disasters with girls as well.

“So, that was it”, Kimiko said, tone final as she put another coat of pink nail-polish on her pinkie. “I was like ‘bye, Lauren, no more white girls for me’.”

Clay shrugged. “I see where you’re coming from.”

“Right?”, she said, nodding. “So, now you tell me something.”

The cowboy scratched his chin. “Like what?”

“Like anything. I feel like I’ve been talking for way too long here.”

“Okay”, Clay began, slowly. “I’m pretty sure my cousin Claudine will be moving into my room next month.”

Kimiko squinted, confused. “I thought your mom turned your room into a half-gym and also, why?”

“Well, the why is because”, the cowboy said. “Because her parents are getting divorced. I think my aunt caught her husband cheating.”

At that, the girl’s eyes widened. “No way, one of my aunts caught her husband cheating too just a week ago!”

“Odd”, Clay said, raising an eyebrow. “I suppose.”

“Well, not really”, Kimiko said, making a so-so gesture. “Remember how a minute ago I said men were trash? This is a reference.”

A pause took over the room for a minute before Clay surveyed the scene. Here he was, on a day off, hanging out with Kimiko alone. So far, she made him a face mask and painted his toenails after they reached a compromise and talked to him about everything there was to talk about on earth.

Overcome by a feeling of love for his friend, this wonderful girl who he considered family, Clay smiled and racked his brains trying to think of something that would make her truly happy.

“Kim”, the cowboy began, finally getting the perfect answer. “Are you in the mood to prank the ever-living crap out of our two friends when they come home?”

Cooing already, Kimiko put a hand to her heart. “A question that only has one answer—yes, Clayton, obviously!”

Smiling, Clay judged that he was more than happy he hadn’t spent his entire morning on the roof. He could always get his tan later.


	11. Raimundo and Kimiko and a 3 A.M. Type of Conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's one joke here from Black Lady Sketch Show.

Sometimes, Kimiko appreciated the temple’s old rustic style.

If they really wanted, they could go on social media cleanses instantly and revert to the old life everyone lead way back in the day. They could wash clothes by hand, they could entertain themselves by never-ending games of _mahjong_, and they could even start their own manual fireplace.

Sometimes, though, she hated this style. For things like the ones she’d just thought about.

_Okay_, she was being overdramatic but she had every right to be. See, Kimiko was sent pick up firewood for the aforementioned manual fireplace.

Rolling her eyes, Kimiko snorted as she passed her chore companion. Raimundo, who was doing nothing but frolicking so far.

While she had a couple of logs in her hands, Raimundo only had a few twigs, if they could be labelled as that. Even that, apparently, was too much work because now he flopped on the ground in the middle of the clearing they’d just found.

“Dude, come on”, Kimiko said, sighing. “What are you doing?”

Raimundo did something of a shrug. “Living the moment. You should really try it.”

Though she’d rolled her eyes at his words, Kimiko was actually tempted to try. Only because he seemed extremely comfortable and, well, they had been walking for an hour.

Dropping the logs beside her, Kimiko let out a small huff and laid down next to her friend.

He was right, she decided. This was good. _Too_ good.

“_Crap_”, Kimiko said a moment later. “Now I don’t wanna get up.”

Raimundo agreed. “I know, this is why I had to drag you down with me.”

“I knew it”, she said, sighing. “I just knew you weren’t doing this for my own well-being but I thought you stopped being a dick for just one second.”

“You cannot force someone to do something they don’t want to do, Kimiko, I didn’t even try to pull you down.”

“You did. With words.”

“It’s called persuasion.”

“Really? And your mom is called—”

“Careful.”

“Wow, touchy”, Kimiko said, scoffing. “What are we supposed to do now?”

Raimundo hummed. “Talk, like normal people do.”

Hearing that, she couldn’t help her chuckles. If there was something they most certainly weren’t, it was normal.

“Yeah, good one. You know we’re not normal.”

“Really? Right now, all I know is we’re just two friends hanging out in the woods, nothing more, nothing less.”

He paused a little.

“Also, normality kind of changes, depending on who you ask. Like, what _is_ normal to you?”

Kimiko shrugged. “You know, just normal. Having a routine that doesn’t have, like, magic or villains or saving the world—pretty basic.”

“Yeah, that’s a little off-brand, isn’t it?”, he said, not really asking.

They both shut up then, both taking in the fresh air and the serenity of the clearing. Kimiko hated to interrupt that, but she did in the end. This was the kind of serenity that made you think, which was why she said that next thing.

“It’s silly”, she said, trying to downplay her feelings. “But I—sometimes I really resent not getting to do things everyone else does. Like, dating, for example.”

“Hold on, hold on”, Raimundo said, giving her a look. “We’re allowed to date. Master Fung didn’t cancel that, did he?”

“No, of course not. It’s just that even though we can, we really don’t.”

She paused now, sighing.

“We’re both seventeen and we’ve both dated people and stuff but neither one of us had had a _real_ relationship, you know. Isn’t that strange?”

“Not really, many seventeen year-olds—”

“Seventeen year-olds like _us_?”

“When you put it like that”, he said, finally answering her question. “I suppose it is, but that’s, that’s not our fault.”

Kimiko raised a finger to the air, as if to wag it at him. “_Exactly_. It’s because our line of work is too hectic for relationships like that—I couldn’t even get to date the one girl I suppose I had a chance at a long shot with.”

“Kimiko”, Raimundo said, seriously now. “That’s a little your fault, if we’re being honest. You should have fought for her, wouldn’t you have wanted someone to do the same for you?”

“I would, but”, she said, before hesitating. Explaining right now would be harder than necessary and Raimundo would never get it. “Never mind, let’s talk about anything else.”

Although he’d made a disapproving noise, Raimundo agreed. “Fine. So…twenty questions?”

“Ugh, Rai”, Kimiko said, cringing. “This is real life not one of your Instagram flirtationships, _ew_.”

“You’re the one who wanted to change the subject!”

“Not like that, though!”

Sighing again, he relented. “Fine, you pick the topics then.”

“Fine”, she agreed, albeit a little sharply. “Um, I guess…_wow_, I have nothing.”

“Not so easy now, is it?”

After a minute or two of silence, Kimiko heard Raimundo starting to hum a little song. She didn’t recognize it, but she wasn’t bothered.

That is, of course, until he decided to go louder and, consequently, annoying.

Slapping a hand on his mouth, Kimiko groaned. “Can we enjoy the silence again?”

“We already did”, Raimundo whined. “Can’t we talk?”

Sighing, Kimiko silently agreed but said nothing. She had nothing to say, really, until she got painfully aware of where they were and how they were sitting, but before she could say anything really, her friend spoke up.

“You know, I noticed you stopped wearing highlighter”, Raimundo began. “Even though you were kind of making it your life’s mission at one point to not be seen without it. Something happen?”

Kimiko shrugged. “Not really, I wasn’t feeling like wearing it all the time anymore, you know, like what’s in my life to highlight?”

At that, the silence returned again for a few seconds. That is, until Kimiko’s attention went back again to how they were laying down.

They were, by their own admissions, already two ridiculously photogenic people and now they were lying in the middle of picturesque clearing. At first sight, it looked like a little scene from one of those teen movies. Like, it definitely wasn’t, but it could have seemed that way.

Unable to help herself at her thoughts, Kimiko snorted and laughed.

“What?”, Raimundo asked, already smiling. “What is it?”

She chuckled again. “It’s just—look, if this was a normal situation in a normal setting, it’d look like we’re just a couple of silly high school kids sneaking out to fool around.”

“Yeah, I guess, you’re right”, he said, after a beat. “Except if we were normal-normal, I’d be holding your hand, like this.”

As he said that, Kimiko already braced herself for the hand he’d sent to grab her own. Sensing something bittersweet in the process, she held his hand and squeezed once.

“Well”, she said, continuing where he left off. “If you were my boyfriend—what, what are you laughing about?”

Struggling to keep a straight face, Raimundo shrugged. “Nothing, I’m just smiling.”

“_Liar_, you were thinking of a Justin Bieber pun, weren’t you?”

“…Maybe.”

“Dickhead”, Kimiko commented, giggling along. “I can’t believe—”

“What were you going to say, though? If I were your boyfriend what?”

“Nothing, I was just gonna say we’d be sitting closer. Like, cuddly-close, kinda like that.”

Smile dimming slightly, Raimundo considered something. “You know, if we keep living like this, we’d probably end up being each other’s backups anyway. Like some sad cautionary tale.”

Smile dying on her lips, Kimiko quickly let go of his hand.

“What?”

“Nothing”, she said, angrily. “I mean, you’re so mad about me possibly being your backup I thought you might not want to hold my hand. You know, just in case.”

Raimundo let out a strangled noise. “What—I’m _not_ mad about you being my possible backup, Kiki, I’m just, well, just…”

“Just mad. _Because_ I could be your backup.”

“Goddammit, no, Kimiko!”

“Then why are you mad?”

“Okay, just to clarify this”, Raimundo said, sitting up straight. “I’m not mad; I was trying for a little depressing joke about our situations. It might have been a little insensitive, yes, but I said it. Can’t we move on?”

Kimiko shrugged, making a noncommittal noise.

Truth was, she wasn’t nearly as ticked off now, but physically hearing Raimundo becoming tense and scrambling over himself to mollify her was music to her ears. Usually he was the one riling her up.

“That ‘mm-hmm’ doesn’t sound like someone moving on from a topic”, he said, urging her for a spoken reply. He paused for a second, smile wavering. “Or is even the thought of dating me that bad?”

_That_ got her attention. Kimiko sat up straight too. 

“No, no, no”, she began, shaking a finger. “You don’t get to turn that on me. That was your problem!”

Raimundo raised an eyebrow. “No, actually, my ‘problem’, as you put it, was that I put you as a backup. You, however, get seriously defensive the few times this topic comes up.”

“I don’t do that”, Kimiko said, quietly reviewing her own memories. “I always play along when people joke about us dating. How is that odd?”

“I—”

“No”, she said, cutting him off. “_How_ is that odd? Tell me when I’ve ever made you feel bad.”

“Well”, Raimundo said. “You always play along, that’s true, but when you play along—you kinda make that joke sound like the fact that we could even date is funny and I think it’s because—”

He cut himself off, but then took a breath before he added with a serious expression on.

“I think it’s because you think you’d be too good for me.”

Jaw dropping, Kimiko struggled to find the words at first. See, he was partially right. A few times, she did get defensive because at those times the joke called for. But she’d never gotten offended at the mere notion.

She’d never thought she was hurting his feelings, either. Not once.

“I’m sorry”, she said. “I thought—I didn’t think you saw it like that. If I knew, I obviously wouldn’t have taken it like that. For what it’s worth, I—never mind.”

More than a little intrigued, Raimundo didn’t let that go. “’No, what were you gonna say?”

“It’s too embarrassing.”

“It’s only us, though.”

“Yeah”, Kimiko said, avoiding his eyes. “I was gonna say—but you cannot hold this over me!”

“Just say it first and then we’ll see.”

“Rai!”

“Okay, girl, I won’t hold it over you. Now, _please_ come the fuck on!”

Sighing, Kimiko scratched her ear embarrassedly. She just had to begin that sentence.

“I was gonna say that if this was the real world and we were just two normal kids, I would be—would have been open to the idea of us maybe dating. I said ‘if’, though. Like, it’s an alternate reality.”

“But”, Raimundo said, grinning and laying back on the ground now. “You also said you’d date me. That’s out there, spoken into the universe. _Verbatim_.”

Naturally, Kimiko pretended to gag and laid back down too. “Great, now you’ll think you really are all that and a side of fries. Just like every other brown boy with green eyes.”

They laughed about that for a while, but Raimundo’s smile twitched a little. Kimiko noticed, but she hadn’t pried. He looked like he was going to talk anyway.

“What do you think our first date would have been like, hypothetically?”

At that, the girl took a pause to think. “I don’t know, you know. Like, in that situation, who do you think would have asked out who?”

“I mean”, he said. “I guess I would have asked you.”

“Well, then you’d be the one to decide where the date would be. So, where would you have taken me?”

Raimundo huffed. “Hard to tell. Like, if we were in Rio, I’d have definitely taken you to Prainha—it’s this beach, but it’s not like the other tourist trap beaches. It’s a bit hidden, mostly surfers go.”

“That’s cool”, Kimiko said. “But that would be for a morning date, right? What if we went out at night?”

“_Prainha_.”

“At night?”

“Girl, you have no idea”, he said, smirking. “The parties there are insane! Sometimes, there are festivals too.”

“Festivals like the one you just went to?”

“Yeah”, Raimundo said, nodding. “Iemanjá Festival. It’s really cool, you know, just an homage to Afro-Brazilian traditions and religion.”

“The photos _were_ stunning”, Kimiko agreed. “You should have taken us.”

He shrugged. “Next year.”

“So”, she said. “What happens next in this fictional date?”

“We get food, obviously, we’re not animals”, Raimundo said. “Get a few beers too, hang out, you know.”

Kimiko smiled. “That sounds great.”

A pause. “You know, if we were in Tokyo and I asked you out, I’d definitely take you to this little snow cone place in Shibuya—it’s the _best_. Like, they have other things too but that’s the best thing you can get.”

“Yeah? How good can it be?”

“Well, they let you put alcohol in your snow cones.”

Raimundo looked interested. “That sounds fun.”

“I know”, Kimiko agreed, nodding animatedly. “And then when we’re done, I’d have taken you to Diver City Mall to see that giant Gundam statue.”

She paused, long enough to roll her eyes. “And I know you’ll be _dying_ to see that since you’re a nerd.”

“Shut up”, he said, whiningly. “But you’re right, I’d have loved that.”

With that said, silence reigned for a few minutes with both teenagers drifting off into their own worlds. The pause ended the minute Kimiko and Raimundo sighed at the same time.

“Some first date that would have been, huh?”

Kimiko hummed before shrugging. “Sure would have been.”

“Okay”, Raimundo said, giving her a determined look. “Let’s do it then.”

“Do what?”, she asked, raising an eyebrow. “You’re aware we said these are hypothetical situations?”

“I am”, he said. “But, say, neither of us dates anyone for a while and then the backup situation kicks in…”

Kimiko smiled. “Then we can go on an amazing first date, Tokyo-Rio connection.”

“Yeah”, Raimundo chuckled. “_Rio_-Tokyo connection. We come first because we’re cooler.”

“Oh, shut up!”


	12. Clay Becomes A Math Tutor

As he cleaned up the studying area in the scroll room, Clay tried to clear his head of all that he’s had to study today. Yes, he knew that was sort of the opposite of studying, but at the same time, his brain felt like one step away from a meltdown.

After a full day of physics and chemistry and English literature, Clay had had enough.

He’d been actually kind of fed up with studying for school lately but he’d judged that was a side-effect of being a high school senior who just couldn’t do it anymore.

At those moments, Clay contemplated if college was really worth it but quickly shoveled those thoughts to the side. The only thing not worth it here, as Jessie and Patrick sometimes said, was getting on Mama’s bad side, as rare a thing as that was.

The American boy wasn’t the only one who was studying but today, he’d been the one who finished last.

Kimiko had only spent an hour, alternating between furiously scribbling notes and texting, before deciding she’d had her fill. Raimundo, too, decided to dip, thirty-minutes later.

That left only Omi, who took his sweet time finishing up a few algebra problems, and Clay, who’d been alternating between his three worse subjects.

A while later, the former had left and so Clay was the only one who’d had a total of four hours of study—something he was definitely cursing himself for in a few minutes. The migraines were _that_ bad.

As he cleaned, Clay tried to put away all thoughts of migraines from his head to not accidentally invite one.

He focused on what was at hand. Kimiko’s colorful gel pens and calculators with the weird stickers on the back and Raimundo’s textbooks where not a single page was free from his surprisingly artistic doodles. Omi, too, left a mess, but it was only a few papers that had—what _was_ that grade?

“A seven out of thirty?”, Clay said, shock making itself known out loud. “How was he solving this? Blind-folded?”

As he looked at the questions, the cowboy saw about sixty algebra problems that, if he was being honest, weren’t that hard. They were actually kind of basic. It was concerning that Omi had gotten any of them wrong.

This wasn’t right, Clay thought, as he massaged his temples. No, it wasn’t and he had to do something about it. Stomping slightly, a determined Clay made his way to the Dragons’ room, shamefully-graded paper in hand.

“Omi”, he said as soon as he walked through the door-less doorway. “What is this?”

Taking his eyes off his comic-book, the boy squinted. “It looks like a math quiz, I guess.”

“There’s no need for guessing”, Clay said, nodding. “It _is_ a math quiz and you failed it.”

“What?”, Omi said, confused. “Clay, I don’t—”

“Look”, the cowboy said, interrupting his friend. “It ain’t a thing to be ashamed of, but you should be concerned. If you’re getting these grades as an eighth-grader, you won’t even imagine how hard high school is going to be.”

Getting off his mat, Omi waked to where his friend stood and snatched the paper out of his hand. He’d looked skeptical at first but as he read, Omi’s frown deepened.

“Oh”, he said.

“Yeah”, Clay said, nodding. “You need a tutor.”

At that, Omi pouted, adorably. “And where will I find a tutor now, Clay?”

“I’m not falling for that, little fella”, the cowboy said. “I already have a lot of math on my plate. I don’t need more.”

“But, but”, the younger boy began. “Kimiko doesn’t know how to teach and Raimundo will mock me!”

He paused. “You know what Master Fung says about tutors, too.”

Sighing, Clay nodded. The sad thing was that he did know what Master Fung say about tutors. They were only allowed in the temple when they had the budget and they almost never did.

“Fine”, the cowboy said. “I’m warning you, though, I may have a lot of patience now but teaching…”

“I understand”, Omi said, nodding immediately. “I’ll take notes.”

Although Omi had said he was taking notes, so far the only thing he was doing was taking Clay’s patience on a test drive. The cowboy didn’t want to sound mean or anything but he was definitely regretting this choice.

“Mother Mary have mercy on me”, he began, muttering. “Omi, what are you not getting?”

Omi huffed. “It’s too complex, Clay!”

“I told you the rule, though”, the older boy said. “All we gotta do is find a common denominator. Simple.”

The Water Dragon snorted. “Yeah, after all the divisions and the root-squaring and the bazillion other rules we have to follow to get to this rule!”

He paused, side-eyeing his friend.

“_Simple_!”

Clay rolled his eyes but had to admit that the younger boy was right. To him, the problem was all too easy because he’d always been good at algebra and this was a younger level, after all. Omi had a point.

“Tell you what”, Clay said, sticking a pen as bookmark and shutting the algebra book. “Let’s take a five minute break. I’m fried.”

Omi nodded and got off his chair and got a soda from the fridge. Glancing at the cowboy, who nodded, the younger boy took another soda out.

“Here you go”, Omi said. “I must say, this brand is much better than the other one you brought.”

Clay pretended to be shocked. “You can’t say that about Kool-Aid, O, it’d be insulting an American classic.”

“So?”, Omi asked, nonchalantly. “You make fun of Trump and the right-wingers all the time and Kimiko says they’re an American classic.”

“She has a point”, the cowboy said. “But that’s a bad classic. Kool-Aid, however, is not.”

Seeing that Omi had nothing to say, Clay smiled to himself, happy that he won the argument. His happiness was short-lived, though, because Omi had something on his mind.

“Clay, can I ask you something?”

Although he’d had half a mind to begin a dad joke, Clay held it off. “Sure, buddy, what’s going on?”

“Am I”, Omi began, taking a deep breath. “Am I likable?”

“Do you even need to ask that, Omi?”, the cowboy said. “Yes, you’re one of the most likable people I know.”

The younger boy nodded, seeming unsatisfied with that answer, but Clay wasn’t going to drop the subject now.

“Why are you thinking about that?”

“No reason.”

“C’mon, Omi”, he said. “You can talk to me.”

Nodding, the boy said nothing at first before sighing. “Fine, I guess I’m just a little worried.”

“What about?”

“It’s not a big deal”, Omi said. “I’m just being a dramatic fourteen year-old, we can let it go.”

“Oh, we’re so not letting it go”, Clay said, shaking his head. “Why would you ask that?”

Biting his lower lip, Omi tilted his head. “I was worried about that because you guys keep hanging with each other—and, obviously, that’s fine and everything—but I don’t feel like you want me there.”

Out of everything he’d expected to hear, Clay expected that last. It didn’t really make sense, especially not coming out of Omi.

“What do you mean? Why would you say that?”

“I don’t know”, the younger boy said. “I’ve been a little moody and all that, always isolating myself and stuff, but—”

“But what?”, Clay asked, remembering all the times that Omi was referring to.

The boy had been being a little moody and he had been staying in his room more than was healthy at times, but no one thought it was strange.

When they’d been in a mood, Kimiko, Raimundo, and Clay also did the whole isolation thing. None had problems coming back to the group, though.

“It’s just that I feel like you’re all close together”, Omi confessed. “With similar interests and tastes and I’ve not—well, I don’t have a place there.”

He paused, hurrying before Clay could say anything.

“I know it’s kind of my fault for not sharing”, Omi said. “And hiding more than I should have, so that’s kind of a weird worry but it’s there. Do you get it?”

“I do”, the cowboy said, not finding anything else to add his input about. “I feel left out sometimes and that sucks but I know I still got y’all, you know.”

“Are you just saying that to make me feel better?”

“Nope, I’m just saying it because it’s true, you know. I’m guessing we’ve all had that moment when we feel like we don’t fit. I feel it when y’all are talking about the things that are common to your countries, Kimiko probably feels it sometimes because she’s the only girl here—”

“And I feel it when you’re all bonding over having lives outside of the temple”, Omi continued. “It happens a lot. What do you do when it happens a lot?”

“You skin your own buffalo.”

“…That’s animal cruelty.”

Clay rolled his eyes. “I meant you muscle through it.”

“That’s it?”, Omi asked, raising an eyebrow and smirking.

“No”, the cowboy said, shrugging. “You should also never feel embarrassed about talking to your friends about feeling left out. We’re here for each other, you know.”

Omi nodded, smiling at his friend. “Thank you for that, Clay. I really mean it.”

“Okay then”, Clay said, stretching. “Let’s get back to some fun algebra!”

“Fuck my life”, the younger boy said, closing his eyes. “It’s like I’m living the myth of Wu Gang.”

“Stop your whining”, the cowboy said, opening the textbook again. “Now sit back in your seat and try to keep up, please. I can explain it to you, but I can’t understand it for you, okay.”

Omi rolled his eyes and got off the table and walked back to his seat next to Clay. He sighed, preparing himself for what was to come.

“Okay, I figured an easy way for you to get this”, the cowboy said. “The fraction part of it, I mean.”

The younger boy nodded, so Clay continued. “Say we have these here six apples and Rai has to share some with Kim. Now, how many apples does he have?”

“Are they red apples or green apples?”, Omi asked, completely ignoring his current tutor’s question.

The cowboy raised an eyebrow. “Does it matter?”

“Just answer the question, Clay”, the other boy said, exasperatedly. Somehow it made Clay feel like he was the nonsensical one.

“Fine”, the cowboy said, waving it off. “Green.”

“Easy”, Omi said, shrugging. “Raimundo would have no apples. You know like I do that he loathes green apples, but Kimiko, on the other hand, loves them!”

Blinking twice, Clay was at a loss for words. When he finally did find his words, he stammered.

“Oh my stars and garters”, he began, though he’d definitely had some stronger words in mind. “_Really_, Omi?”

Omi raised his hands up. “What? It makes sense! Besides, even if by some miracle it turns out that Raimundo likes those apples, he may not want to share with Kimiko. Or he can take four and she’ll take two—it doesn’t have to be an exact split, that’s what I mean.”

“You’re putting way too much thought into it”, Clay said, after a beat. “The model answer is each would have three and—”

“Oh, I know”, Omi said, sighing. “And you know what? I can’t do this anymore. Clay, I’ve been lying to you.”

The cowboy frowned, confused. “When exactly?”

“Okay, so technically I didn’t lie”, the younger boy said. “You just assumed, but you assumed wrong and I didn’t correct you, so, ethically, it can be considered a lie.”

“Partner, partner”, Clay said, stopping his friend from rambling on more. “Can you explain?”

“Which part?”

“All of it”, the cowboy said. “What part did I assume that you didn’t clarify?”

Omi shut his eyes. “The part where I’m bad at algebra. I’m actually an ace now.”

He paused, seeing the shock settle on Clay’s horrified face.

“Dojo and Master Fung both tried to tutor me after they saw my grades”, he said. “And they failed, so they saved up to get me a tutor, of course.”

“Well, that tutor didn’t do a good job”, Clay said, shaking his head. “That quiz—”

“Is old”, Omi finished. “It’s from three years ago. I was just using the blank side of the paper to solve some problems.”

Hearing this, Clay turned the quiz on its back and saw that Omi was, in fact, solving newer problems. The handwriting seemed fresher too and all the work was actually—

“Right”, Clay said. “You haven’t messed up one problem.”

“I told you I got better”, Omi said, cockily.

Scratching his chin, the older boy didn’t know what to say. If this was all a big misunderstanding, then it was one that had taken too much of their day. They’d been at the kitchen table studying for almost three hours, driving everyone away from the room.

One thing didn’t add up, though. Suspiciously, Clay glanced at Omi, who glanced back innocently.

“And you didn’t say anything because…?”

“Oh”, the younger boy said, shrugging. “I just thought we needed to hang out more.”

Getting off his chair, Omi patted his friend on the back twice before walking to the door, so casually Clay almost bought this as a common enough interaction.

“You know, we should do this more often”, Omi said, fading out of earshot.

Letting out a breath he didn’t know he was holding, Clay took a look around the kitchen and the notes piled on the table. Do this more often, the little rascal said. Figures it’d just be more cleaning up for Clay anyway.

“Yeah _right_”, he muttered to himself. “Next time we’re sticking to playing video games.”


	13. Much Ado About Ikea

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PS: I know nothing about installing Ikea things. I've never brought anything that had to be put together from there, I'm just making it up as I go. Anyway, it's all in good fun.

It was safe to say the Xiaolin temple possessed a lot of polyglots.

Clay spoke English, Spanish, and some Vietnamese because of his stepmother, while Omi knew Mandarin, Cantonese, English, and a few curse words in Thai.

Kimiko spoke Japanese, (neglected) Mandarin, English, and Spanish, while Raimundo knew Portuguese, Spanish, English, French, and some Swahili.

That put the Dragons at three, three-and-a-half, four, and five languages each. Though the latter two argued that they were at five and six languages because both considered Klingon a real language.

None of this mattered right now, anyway. The fact remained that despite all of these languages, none of the Dragons could read the manual.

“What is this even supposed to mean?”, Omi said, turning the manual upside down. “Kimiko, where the hell are the other languages?”

Said girl scoffed. “How the fuck am I supposed to know, Omi? I’m not an Ikea engineer, okay, I ordered it online like everyone else does.”

“He has a point, though”, Raimundo said, snatching the manual before shaking his head and handing it to Clay. “You could have done something, like, I don’t know—_not_ order it from Sweden?”

Kimiko glared. “I thought it would be more authentic!”

“Well, you thought wrong.”

Before the arguing could continue, Clay stepped in, trying to mouth out the words on the manual.

“It’s weird”, the cowboy said, summing up the entire morning after they un-boxed the pieces. “But it’s like I can tell what some words mean but all together, I’m just blanking.”

Omi nodded. “You should have continued your Duolingo lessons, Clay. I don’t know how you managed to get that terrifying owl out of your way.”

Pausing, the youngest of the group came to a conclusion.

“Why don’t we just internet-translate it?”

“Gee, I don’t know why we didn’t think of that, Omi”, Raimundo sarcastically said. “Do you have a Swedish keyboard on your phone? We can’t even _write_ this.”

Kimiko sighed. “Sadly, he’s right. And we can’t even download it because the internet’s still gone.”

“Master Luo hasn’t paid the bill yet?”, Clay asked, temporarily leaving the manual. “Wow, we have to talk to Master Fung about this, the man is _always_ late.”

“I agree”, Omi said, inspecting a few pieces of strangely shaped wood. “So what we have here until further notice is just a waste of money?”

Although Kimiko was fuming, Raimundo nodded and threw a sarcastic smile her way. “You got it, dude! Worst investment I ever made.”

“Strange”, the girl said. “I seem to recall some questionable highlights a few months ago.”

“My barber said it looked nice at the time.”

“You looked like a failed 90’s boy-band member, Rai. Anyone with half a lick of sense would know your barber is a _liar_.”

“Don’t fucking insult João, you—"

“Fellas, fellas”, Clay said, stepping in between the two. “We can’t get anything done if we keep raising hell and sticking a chunk under it! We’re not gonna let a bookshelf rip our team apart.”

Kimiko and Raimundo shared a look before the latter spoke. “It’s a bookshelf?”

“Well, erm”, the cowboy said. “I’m not exactly sure but it kinda...feels like it? I don’t know how to explain it.”

Omi sighed. “Hello, square one, we’re back.”

The youngest of the group was right, which made the rest go through a predictable range of emotions. Kimiko sighed, while Raimundo face-palmed, and Clay shut his eyes and muttered a silent prayer.

“Whatever it is”, Kimiko said. “Do you think Master Fung will like it?”

Omi shrugged. “I hope so. If it’s a bookshelf, he’ll appreciate it because he has a lot of books. If it’s not, then, well—we’ll find something.”

Sighing, Raimundo tried everything in his power to not complain. It was just their luck to have what would have been a simple task turn into a lost-in-translation nightmare.

It didn’t help that Master Fung’s birthday was in two days, which probably wasn’t enough time to figure out this mess of a wood pile. He sighed again. There was only one solution here and no one was going to like it.

“We should tell Dojo”, Raimundo began only to get several protests all at once, all for good reasons.

Clay groaned. “C’mon, Rai, telling Dojo a secret means _everyone_ knows—he’s got a mouth as big as hell and half of Texas!”

“Yeah”, Kimiko agreed, giving the boy a condescending look. “Where were you the last couple of years, in a coma?”

Raimundo rolled his eyes. “We’re kinda short on time here.”

“He’s right about that”, Omi said, snapping a finger. “Maybe we can trick Dojo into helping us?”

“Yeah, that won’t be at all suspicious”, Kimiko said, scoffing. “We’re gonna ask him to help us with a wooden contraption that _totally_ has nothing to do with Master Fung’s birthday—that’s not gonna fly and you know it.”

“I don’t know if you know this, Meal Ticket”, Raimundo began, to a couple of eye-rolls. “Sometimes when people talk to you, you have to unwind your eyebrows and listen.”

He paused, then shrugged. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

* * *

To say that Kimiko was pissed might have been a slight understatement. She was definitely irked, though.

“What’s the worst that could happen, huh Rai?”

Taking his hammer-holding hand off the contraption, Raimundo sighed and gave her an apologetic look.

“How could I have predicted this, dude, come on”, he said. “Do you want more ice?”

Nursing her wounded hand, Kimiko shook her head and settled her glare back on the work in progress. This wasn’t missed by Dojo, who flew until he floated between the two teenagers.

“Not to intrude on a touching moment of friends bonding”, the ancient dragon said. “But we’re kind of on a tight schedule and I see two workers missing in action.”

Since Dojo’s voice was loud enough, Omi and Clay heard him too and to that statement they only had a singular reaction option. Scoff or make sarcastic quips under their breaths to hold back any given anger they might have wanted to dish out.

After Raimundo suggested it, the warriors went to the dragon to ask him for help, which he was happy to give, but not before getting out every detail.

“This is so cute, you kids”, Dojo had said, clasping his claws together. “Wen is definitely going to appreciate this. Trust me, no one in this temple has even brought him a nail-clipper!”

Though her nose twitched in faint disgust, Kimiko tried to politely smile. “Oh, we know.”

The ancient dragon had his uses, it turned out. Among the several skills he had, Dojo knew many languages and yes, Swedish was one of them.

“We have to prepare ourselves as guardians”, the dragon explained. “You never know where you’ll find your next Dragon.”

However, this didn’t mean that everything was sunshine and lollipops. Somehow, none of the teenagers knew that Dojo, the fun-loving, frolicking, lazy Dojo, could be a little bit of a—

“Dictator”, Clay said, after their first day under the dragon’s supervision. “He’s an actual _dictator_, I swear it on my Great-Nana Cathy's grave!”

No one needed any elaboration; they all knew what the cowboy was talking about. In the few hours Dojo had taken charge, he'd nearly worked the Xiaolin warriors to near-exhaustion, something that hadn't happened at the temple since the first day of training. Dojo had given them all their tools and hammers before barking the orders. _Nail this_, _fix that_, _get shrimp prawn chips, you're not doing enough_, and—his favorite, so far—_q__uit your whining_.

Kimiko nodded, taking a sip from her water bottle. “I know! I’d never have imagined Dojo to be this much of an ass in a million years—it’s _Dojo_.”

“I think he was nicer that one day he was evil”, Raimundo mused. “Can you believe he called _me_ whiny?”

Omi and Clay shared a look, before the former nodded. “Yeah, but still it doesn’t mean he should have in that context. It was bit much.”

“I nearly injured my hand”, Kimiko said, waving her yet-unhurt left hand around. “He’s letting that limited power get to his scaly little brain!”

The next day, when Kimiko did finally injure her hand, Dojo couldn’t see why it was a problem.

“I know several dragons who lost a couple of limbs and several claws doing lesser things”, he said. “And you know what? They picked up and carried on—no biggie.”

With a pained expression on her face, Kimiko couldn’t properly glare. “Yeah, they were _actual_ dragons, so maybe a couple of claws here and there didn’t hurt them but I only have two hands!”

“I was including Xiaolin warriors too”, Dojo said, raising one claw to usher silence. “Get back to work!”

So they did and tried to work, though the instructions Dojo kept reading out were getting weirder and stranger. This was nothing close to a bookshelf and that was strikingly clear.

“Can you at least tell us what it’s supposed to be, Dojo?”, Omi asked, handing Clay the extra nail he required.

The dragon stroked his red beard. “Well, it’s supposed to be, you know, one of those human things.”

“Yes, we know that”, Clay said, momentarily stopping his work. “What kinda human thing, though? What’s the manual saying?”

“Um, well”, Dojo began, stammering a little. “It’s supposed to be this, you know, where you keep all the things. That thingamajig.”

“Partner, there are many thingamajigs in that store. You mean, a bookcase?”

“Well, no—”

“So, it’s display box?”, Kimiko asked, tone a little passive-aggressive.

“It’s kinda specific, but I just don’t really…”

“Maybe it’s a drawer-unit?”, Omi guessed, hopefully. “That can make sense, right?”

“I’m not exactly sure”, Dojo began, sighing resignedly. “In the beginning, I thought it might be some frame-set but now, it’s too jumbled up so I can’t really tell.”

Raimundo raised an eyebrow. “How did you think this was a frame-set when there’s this many pieces? Didn’t you read the manual?”

When the dragon gave no respond, the warrior had a realization. As if in a great amount of pain, Raimundo shut his eyes and sighed.

“Dojo, when did you say you learned Swedish?”

“…In the early 1200's, give or take a few decades.”

Clay blinked. “But back then, they spoke Old Swedish, didn’t they?”

“So, this means”, Omi began, reaching the painful conclusion. “That the language has entirely changed since then. Goodness, Dojo!”

“I didn’t think it’d be that different”, the dragon began. “Usually, it takes you guys a while to evolve languages!”

Kimiko give the dragon a glare. “And the Swedes did it in record timing. Now what?”

“Now”, Raimundo began, snatching the manual from Omi and ripping it in half. “We wing it.”

Omi nodded. “Yes, screw Ikea!”

“Let’s get to work then”, Clay said, clapping his hands. “_No one_ can play ABBA. I’m not in the mood for any more Swedish.”

* * *

Twelve hours later, it was time for Master Fung’s party, if they could call it that.

Since Xiaolin monkhood had many rules, the Dragons couldn’t exactly call what they were throwing their teacher a party, per say.

It was just a late-night gathering in their kitchen, over food, drinks, and cake and they had a present for him. Even though it technically was a party in every sense of the word, Master Yang, one of the elders, had given them a long-winded lecture about using that word.

So there they were, in their kitchen, waiting for Master Fung so they could start their non-party party and hoping he wouldn’t be too disappointed by his present.

“It’s a piece of crap”, Kimiko said, sighing. “I can’t believe I’m going to be giving a literal piece of crap as a birthday present to someone I care about.”

Clay shrugged, unconvincingly. “It’s the thought that counts. By the way, you’re using ‘literal’ wrong.”

“By the way”, she said, way too cheerily. “I do not care.”

“Shush”, Omi said. “He’s coming.”

Taking positions in the dark, the teenagers waited, each with their own popper until a loud, embarrassingly obvious Dojo turned on the lights.

“So”, the dragon was saying, in a way too loud voice that hoped to give them a hint. “I said to Huang that if he doesn’t—”

The teenagers interrupted then, chorusing as one, “Surprise!”

As the lights turned, none of the Dragons could say they were disappointed by the reactions they got. Master Fung had a look of clear surprise on his face, somehow not seeing this coming in a mile.

“Young monks, what’s all of this?”

Omi began first, throwing his hands in the air. “It’s a party for your birthday, Master Fung!”

“Yeah, sir, we thought you deserved it”, Clay added, sheepishly. “It’s a special occasion and we know it ain’t a summer breeze dealing with us all the time.”

Kimiko nodded, beaming. “We just wanted to let you know we appreciate everything you do for us as a teacher.”

“Not just as a teacher”, Raimundo hastily added, nudging the girl. “We may not say it enough—or at all actually, Master Fung, but for some of us, you’re a pretty kick-ass father figure.”

Although Master Fung was smiling, it took him a while to begin to speak again.

“Young monks”, he began. “I can safely say I’m to—”

“Oh, this is just so precious!”, Dojo interrupted, sniffling. “I wish I had a camera for this—see, _this_ is why I told you we needed to invest in a video camera, Wen!”

Pausing, the dragon took a look around the room. From the glares, he understood he’d interrupted a moment, so he embarrassingly ducked his head into the spiral-shape he’d taken around Master Fung’s neck.

“As I was saying”, the old man said. “I can safely say I’m touched. I appreciate you too and I will certainly cherish this, especially on the days where I’m admittedly rather short on patience with your shenanigans.”

Omi smirked. “I knew it; you only pretend to not be upset then.”

“Showing anger will not solve any issue”, Master Fung said. “But indeed I did get ‘pissed off’, as you kids say.”

Clay chuckled for a minute before a firm cough from Dojo grabbed his attention. The dragon was mouthing at him to get the gift, which immediately made the cowboy deflate.

“Ah, yeah, so”, Clay began, eloquently. “So, we didn’t just throw a few decorations and cake around, Master Fung. We also got you a gift.”

“A gift?”, the old man asked, tone strikingly neutral.

Kimiko scratched her neck. “Yeah, it’s definitely something. We, um, we know you’re into artistic shi—stuff so we think you’ll like it.”

“Nice save”, Raimundo muttered before turning to Master Fung. “You’ll want to close your eyes for this one.”

The old man did as he was told, so the teenagers yanked the sheets covering the contraption behind them off. Cringing simultaneously, they tried to not let the disgust slip into the general mood.

“Should I open my eyes now?”

“I wouldn’t recommend it”, Omi said. “But sure, why not?”

Opening his eyes, Master Fung found himself staring an odd _something_ in the eye. He couldn’t make out what it was at first, so he tilted his head. Sadly, it made it more confusing.

“This is certainly a surprise”, the old man said, coughing slightly. “It’s a representation of something, I'm sure.”

Raimundo scoffed and instantly tried masking that with clearing his throat. “Oh, is it?”

“Yes, young monk”, Master Fung said, closely examining the structure. “It’s a representation of you not knowing how to follow a simple Ikea manual.”

The revelation put the room in a minute of silence as they all comprehended what the old man just said. After an awkward beat, Kimiko clicked her tongue.

“Personally, I think it looks a little like The Thinker”, she said, trying out her luck. “Like, in a minimalist lens.”

“Child”, Master Fung said, voice completely deadpan. “This is an apothecary table.”

Omi crossed his arms. “And how do we know that?”

“There are more than seven handles, for one”, the old man said. “Didn’t you read the manual while assembling it?”

The three Dragon boys turned to Kimiko, who guiltily twiddled her thumbs. “I may have ordered a Swedish-only version, so that made things…not easy.”

“I see”, Master Fung began, stroking his beard. “Well, wisdom is a comb we receive when we go bald.”

“You certainly know all about that, Master Fung”, Raimundo said, jokingly.

Knowing what the boy was thinking, Master Fung gave him an admonishing look before turning his gaze to the rest of his students.

On every birthday he’d had so far, Master Fung usually wished he had a shorter day, but this day might turn out to be a little different. This was his ‘party’, wasn’t it?

“Students”, he said, pleasantly. “We’re going to fix this. Go get the tools.”

Although the answer was chorus of groans and complaints, the teenage warriors weren’t all that bothered by the end of this night. They’ll still have cake afterwards, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to repeat, I know nothing about Ikea and I don't know if they have Swedish-only manuals.


	14. Just One Chill Conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't even know.

Hidden behind a divider Kimiko had hastily put together over her section of the room’s doorway so they could hide from the youngest warrior, Clay and Raimundo and the girl herself were enjoying their downtime.

“Quit hogging it”, Clay said, in a chastising tone. “Go on, Rai, it’s Kim’s turn now.”

Raimundo ignored him. “It’s puff, puff, pass as in I get two puffs _before_ I pass. And I rolled it, so your opinion doesn’t matter.”

“You’re just a barrel of diplomacy, aren’t you?”, Kimiko asked, rolling her eyes before taking the blunt. “Always with the courtesy.”

Barely shrugging, the Wind Dragon continued staring at the ceiling, ignoring both of his friends lying down on either side of him. It was quite odd that the ceiling was very uninteresting now when usually it got incredibly entertaining when he was being yelled at.

“Hey”, Kimiko said, passing the goods to Clay before taking a bite of the donuts she'd brought. “Why is it when alien invasion movies happen, they always take place in the United States? Like, is there a secret message there or they just too self-centered to think about other countries?”

“They were probably going somewhere there, about capitalism and consumer culture, y’know”, Clay said at the same time Raimundo forgot his donut, snorted and said, “They’re arrogant, ignorant, and think the world revolves around them!”

At that, the cowboy sighed. “You do have a point there, Rai, but you have to keep a broad mind here. I know respect is earned but you gotta give us 'Muricans the benefit of the—”

“Who says that?”, Kimiko said, scrunching her nose. “Respect is given, not earned.”

Clay blinked. “It’s earned, like you gotta earn it through your hard work and stuff. It’s the first thing a parent tells you.”

“No”, she said, slowly like she was talking to a child. “The first thing kids are taught is that everyone deserves respect unless they do something that makes you question that.”

After a tense five-second stare-down, Clay and Kimiko turned to their friend, the latter speaking first.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but”, Kimiko said, exasperatedly. “Raimundo, can you please add some common sense to this conversation?”

Taking a second bite of his donut, Raimundo shrugged. “Yeah.”

“Is respect earned through hard work and perseverance”, Clay asked. “Or is it given like half-eaten cold samples at Walmart?”

“Respect isn’t given or earned”, Raimundo said. “It doesn’t exist. In fact, you can expect disrespect about five times a day.”

Sharing a look and an eye-roll, Kimiko and Clay both flopped back down, dejected at neither winning the third round of their daily Japan-America battle. Raimundo paid them no mind, instead asking a question of his own.

“Hey”, he said, taking a puff. “Do you think that zombies, like, smell fear. The way dogs do, I mean?”

Kimiko made a vague gesture. “Valid question, but it all depends on the interpretation really. Are we talking Walking Dead zombies or World War Z zombies?”

“How about Zombie Strippers zombies?”

“That’s a very specific situation, though”, Clay said, sounding a bit confused. “Like, can these zombies smell other specific scents like dogs do? Can they track living people like that?”

Raimundo adjusted himself so that he was leaning against the far wall and was soon joined by the other two. “I don’t know, man, I was just trying to make casual conversation and you made it all nerdy.”

“Nerdy?”, Clay said, scoffing. “You truly have no idea how sound when someone brings up Star Trek. Or Storm from X-Men.”

“That’s because Storm is an international treasure”, Raimundo said, warningly. “Don’t try me, this _is_ the hill I’m going to die on.”

Kimiko nodded. “And Star Trek is the superior nerd brand, you know. Like, it’s got Uhura, Kirk, McCoy, Scotty, Spock, motherfucking Sulu—oh my God, the _Klingons_!”

“Those names mean nothing to me”, Clay said, shaking his head. “I truly do not care, sorry guys.”

Raimundo clicked his tongue. “It’s okay, we’re all bound to disagree. You don’t recognize talent, we don’t recognize that dumpster-fire you’re still into.”

“Daenerys deserved better”, the cowboy angrily said, more to himself than anything else. “She just did.”

Kimiko nodded, though she wasn’t really following the entire thing, which didn’t go unnoticed by an in-the-mood-for-shit-stirring Raimundo. He gave her a smirk before beginning his tirade.

“You know who else liked Game of Thrones?”, he asked, innocently enough. “Ziyi.”

Clay nodded. “Oh right, where did she go? Kim, do you know?”

“Why would I?”, Kimiko said, shooting Raimundo a glare. “We don’t talk and I’d rather neither of you, particularly _you_, get into my business.”

“_Your_ business?”, Raimundo said, incredulously. “You were supposed to set me up with her cousin with the pink hair—man, I was waiting for that date but of course, you had to go and blow it up with old girl even though you were the one who called dibs.”

“You can’t call dibs on people, Rai. They’re _people_, not extra dumplings.”

Clay snorted, inserting himself into conversation. “I reckon you were all for dibs _and_ dumplings that night, little lady.”

“Yeah”, Raimundo said, chuckling. “And then she was so shy she couldn’t even hit on her and I had to do all the work. Say what you want but wing-men have it rough!”

“Ugh”, Kimiko said. “No one told you to do it, _Mom_.”

Both boys paid the complaining girl no mind. Raimundo chuckled now.

“Hey, Clay, when did you know Kiki blew it? I did when she gave her a copy of Vogue because it ‘_will always remind her of Kimiko_’.”

The cowboy smirked. “I did when Ziyi got offended and nearly threw the magazine away and Kim said she should keep page seventeen at least because it had tips on casual-wear.”

As they laughed, Kimiko glared for a second before she chuckled too, lost in the moment and the rush for her own pettiness.

“Fine, but dumped over text”, she said, gesturing to the cowboy first before turning to the other boy. “And, had to plan his funeral to avoid his ex. I got the best deal, at least I have a funny story!”

Raimundo shrugged. “It’s not my fault you went around spreading your evil eye and got her doing stupid shit.”

“I just got dumped because he found someone better”, Clay said. “I don’t feel that bad about it, other fish in the sea y’know.”

Kimiko sighed. “That’s admirable. And stupid. Who would leave a Dragon and go for a fucking _fish_, Clay? That’s bestiality.”

Before Kimiko could add more points, the divider she’d put up was being moved and folded.

Caught off-guard by the moment and too high to really do anything about it, the three teenagers watched as Omi took a look at them, so shocked and in disbelief he didn't even notice the smoke.

“Guys?”, he said. “I’ve been calling on you for several minutes now, we have a Wu to find!”

Bleary-eyed, Clay nodded. “Yeah.”

“What yeah?”, Omi said. “Dojo is suffering the mother of all allergic reactions because this is a powerful Wu reawakening and if we get it, we’ll possibly avert a coming Heylin Eclipse!”

At that, Kimiko clicked her tongue, snapping her fingers while talking. “Okay, we’ll just get up and get the Wu, like that. You know, how we always do.”

“Your finger snap is off, Kimiko”, Omi said, giving the girl a weird look. “And you’re all being weird. Raimundo, why aren’t you speaking? Like, hello?”

“Hi”, Raimundo said, a shit-eating grin already on his face. “Are you doing okay, O? Everything fine?”

Raising an eyebrow at the odd reaction, Omi took a look at the other two teenagers. Clay was biting his lower lip to keep from laughing and Kimiko had the mother of all poker faces on.

Neither reaction, naturally, prevented Omi from finally seeing the trail of smoke behind Kimiko’s back, where she was unsuccessfully hiding the blunt.

“High. You're so high, aren't you?”, Omi said, sighing exasperatedly, already knowing the answer.

Confused, Raimundo tilted his head. “But we already said hello?”

“Great Ghost of Dashi!”, Omi said, getting slowly pissed off. “Wait here, I’m getting the Orb of Tornami.”

As Omi trudged away, angry and stomping, the three teenagers shared amused looks, not quite understanding.

Confused, Clay scrunched his face and turned to face the other two.

“What’s _his_ problem?”


	15. The Dragons Dig Up A Time Capsule

Slowly dragging the shovel across dampened ground, Kimiko tried to stifle her growing discontent. They’d been out in the woods near Mount Song for almost two hours now and it didn’t seem like they’d be leaving anytime soon. At least, not if Raimundo could help it.

“Would you pick a fucking spot already?”, she said, anger finally getting the best of her. “We have to start _somewhere_.”

Raimundo nodded. “I know, I know, but I swear I remember where it was, the exact spot. Just give me a second.”

“Technically, partner”, Clay said, monotonously. “You had about six-thousand and three hundred of those. Mighty impressive how you shaved half of that time complaining.”

“Shut up”, the younger boy said. “It takes time to jog a photographic memory.”

Omi scoffed. “Maybe you just don’t have one of those, Raimundo. You kind of need a brain to have a memory.”

“Wow, a harsh dig from Omi”, Raimundo said, deadpanned. “Glad I lived to see the day.”

A beat later, the boy with the old, handwritten map snapped his fingers.

“Yeah, got it”, Raimundo said, much to the relief of the other teenagers. “Kiki, it’s right there.”

Turning to see where he was pointing, Kimiko scoffed and turned back to glare. “_There_? The spot I first wanted to dig and you were like ‘nah, this isn’t it’? _That_ spot?”

“Pretty much”, Raimundo shrugged, while Omi rolled his eyes and turned himself to whisper to Clay.

“I bet you a chore they’ll fight.”

“That’s a lost bet”, Clay said, shrugging. “I bet you two Raimundo’s gonna start it.”

Omi nodded. “We’ll see.”

After he shook hands with the youngest teenager to confirm the bet he was sure to win, Clay sighed and grabbed his own shovel before getting to helping Kimiko.

“Y’know”, the cowboy began, tone too pleasant for the words to come. “I cannot wrap my head around why Kim and I are the only ones doing the digging here.”

Omi gave him a look. “Because you’re the only weirdos with personal shovels for some reason. We don’t have any at the temple.”

“Still, you could have went to the big grocery store in town and bought a couple. Must we really do everything ourselves around here?”

"Maybe you should channel passive-aggressiveness into something useful, buddy”, Raimundo said, re-checking his map. Lifting his head to see the murderous looks on both Kimiko and Clay's eyes, he explained. “Look, we’ve all seen Omi at the beach and we know he’s shit with digging—”

“_Hey_!”

“And I’m not that great at it either.”

“I don’t know”, Kimiko said, already starting to dig. “We could have used the extra help instead of you two lounging around while we finish the job.”

“Girl, I am doing something”, Raimundo said, incredulously. “I’m supervising.”

Though she wanted nothing more than to use her many curse words, Kimiko held herself back. Currently, there was something more important. Her shovel was hitting something.

“I think we got it”, Kimiko said, looking to Clay. “Dude, help me.”

The cowboy nodded. “Yes, sir!”

Three more minutes of hurried digging later, the teenagers had finally reached their target. A raggedy old hemp-sack inside of which there was a metal box covered with dust and age.

“It’s still in good shape”, Clay commented, surprised.

Omi smirked. “I told you, it’s soil and waterproofed.”

“Guess you were right, partner”, the cowboy said. “Erm, can I do the honors?”

Kimiko shrugged while the other two gave signs of general assent, so Clay unlocked the box and took out the four small grey containers. Sighing, he sat down with the containers in his lap.

“Well”, Raimundo said, taking his seat like the other two did, though he wasn’t exactly able to contain his excitement. “Let’s open one of them.”

Omi didn’t like the hurry. “Raimundo, you can’t just—we can’t just go and—”

“And what? Open the time-capsule to see what we put inside it? That’s literally the whole point, Big Head.”

“Fuck you”, Omi said, narrowing his eyes at the condescending tone. “And we have to have some kind of process. This will lose all symbolism if we don’t have a, you know, some kind of—does anyone get what I’m trying to say?”

“You want some kind of ceremony”, Kimiko said, nodding. “I agree, without that it’ll just lose its meaning.”

A pause. “Okay, so we, the Xiaolin Dragons of the Xiaolin Temple of Dengfeng, have gathered here today—”

“To witness the joining of two souls in love”, Raimundo jokingly added.

“Shut up, Rai”, the girl said. “We gathered to dig up the old time-capsule we buried here five years ago.”

A pause. “_Yabai_, five years—what, were we, like, thirteen?”

“You two were thirteen”, Clay said, gesturing at both Kimiko and Raimundo. “I was fourteen.”

Raimundo clicked his tongue. “Actually, I was still twelve then. I sold you all out like a month after the capsule thing, remember?”

“Yes, yeah, I remember that”, Omi said, nodding slowly. “I was _ten_. Time flies.”

Clay tipped his hat and nodded too. “Tell me about it, partner. It’s like time went by faster than small-town gossip!”

“Does anyone even remember what we said we’d put in this thing?”, Raimundo asked, already growing jittery. Remembering all those years ago meant he vaguely remembered what he'd left inside his box. If it was the object he had in mind, then he couldn't wait to get it back.

Vividly remembering the day the not-yet-tight-knit group spent googling group-bonding activities (_for the world's sake, as Dojo put it_) only to end up choosing time-capsules, the laziest option on the list, Kimiko leaned back against a fallen log and smiled, more to herself than anything else.

“Yeah, we said we’d put one thing from the past, something that really represented us and meant a lot of us at the time.”

“Okay”, Omi nodded, satisfied with the quasi-ceremony. “Container number one!”

Taking the small container from Clay, the youngest warrior smiled knowingly as he opened it. “Of course, it’s mine.”

Raimundo snorted. “Just tell us what’s in it, O.”

“Fine”, Omi began. “So because we said we were choosing something from the past—don’t laugh—I decided to put this.”

He held up the polaroid photo for everyone to see before first passing it to Kimiko, who passed to the two other boys. It was a simple photo of a baby Omi, or as simple as a baby photo would be if he wasn’t in a crib with a not-yet-so-aged Master Fung and Dojo.

“You know, it took me a lot of time to find that”, Omi said, clearing his throat. “Because when we said something from the past, I didn’t, well, I didn’t think I’d find anything to put because I didn’t really _have_ a past before the temple.”

He paused. “But then I remembered I did have a few baby photos so I took the only one Dojo wouldn’t miss.”

Kimiko smirked. “You were a cutesy little runt then too.”

“I do my best”, Omi said, faux-humbly. “I can’t really help my good-looking genes, even as a baby. Who wants to go next?”

“I do”, Clay said, opening his container. “I just remembered what I put in here and I need you guys to see it. Look at it, look at this. Beautiful, eh?”

“Dude”, Raimundo said. “That’s a doll.”

Clay sent him a withering look. “That’s an action figure and it’s a collectible too, y’know. Besides, you wouldn’t believe the story behind it.”

Taking a breath, the cowboy fixed his friends with the animated look he often got when he was about to tell an interesting story.

“Y’all”, Clay began, as if they wouldn’t believe it. “My Grandpa Phil, he was cooler than a well-digger’s knee! One day, there was this ad on TV about this action figure and I just had to have it, so Grandpa Phil went and got it for me.”

He paused. “And Daddy didn’t really like action figures so he kept talking about how I couldn’t have this ‘doll’ even if Grandpa did buy it. But Grandpa bought it—”

“That sounds like a regular story to me”, Kimiko began. “Like, where’s the—”

Clay shot her a withering look. “And then he got mugged outside the store, as one does.”

“Right there”, Raimundo said, nudging Kimiko. “There’s the story.”

The cowboy blocked them out, continuing. “Anyway, so the mugger ran away with my action figure but my Grandpa would rather charge hell with a bucket of ice water than let him get away so he ‘borrowed’ a policeman’s motorcycle and hopped on and got it back. And Daddy didn’t have the heart to follow his threats on returning the action figure.”

“He sounds incredible, Clay”, Omi said. “Will he be there at the reunion you invited us to?”

“Well, nah”, Clay said, shrugging. “He died a long time before I came to the temple.”

Raimundo clicked his teeth. “I'm sorry, man. We’d have loved to meet him.”

A pause. “Kiki, you’re up.”

“Me? You’re next in line”, Kimiko said, gesturing at her friend’s seating.

“Yeah, but I don’t wanna sound like a copycat so you go first.”

“Fine”, the girl said. “God, what did I put into this thing.”

As she fished around the container, Kimiko got a weird look in her eye. She took out a video-game CD and gave her friends a look, like she herself was surprised.

“This is a Tekken game”, Kimiko said, still in disbelief.

Clay nodded. “We can see that. Why, though?”

“Yes, isn’t your father a game developer?”, Omi asked, confused. “It would make sense if you put one of his games.”

Raimundo agreed. “This is literal treason, I’m telling your dad.”

“Can you guys shut up for a second”, Kimiko said, trying to think. “I’m trying to remember why I put…”

Drifting off with her thoughts, Kimiko took a second before she snapped her fingers.

“Right! So, funny story—I bought this game behind Papa’s back because, well, you know, competitors and all and I didn’t want him to find out because he’d be upset. He didn't want me to get it because he thought it'd be 'too violent'.”

Through the other two boys' snorts and laughs, Omi raised an eyebrow and asked, “So you buried it in the time-capsule?”

“Yeah”, she said. “I mean, it still works in representing my past, you know, because it’s still a video game and my father’s a video game person so yeah, it's a stand-in for what shaped me the most growing up.”

She paused a little, giving Clay enough time to ask his question. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Kim, but I always thought you put away something of your mom’s.”

“My mom”, Kimiko said, raising an eyebrow. “I mean, I thought about it but I never really—all that I have left of her, like something personally _hers_, is this pearl hairpin. She was wearing it in every photo she’s in.”

A pause. “It’s really the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, you know. When I was younger, I even believed Papa’s story about how Mama got the hairpin by defeating a mermaid in solving a puzzle.”

To the multiple looks she was getting, Kimiko rolled her eyes. “Yeah, my dad’s weird. We already established that. Anyway, the hairpin is back home in Tokyo and even if I had it I wouldn’t bury it in the ground, you know. It’s really valuable.”

Another pause. “Rai?”

“Yeah”, Raimundo nodded, opening his container. “My turn, but I guess you all already know what I put here.”

Smiling, he dangled his old medallion in front of the others, who either smiled or nodded, kind of already seeing it coming.

“I remember you stopped wearing it at one point”, Omi said. “But then you wore it again and I was so confused.”

Raimundo explained. “Yeah, I have two of those, an original and a knockoff.”

“And that’s the OG”, Clay said, pointing. “Let me guess, real gold?”

“Yup”, the other boy said. “But that’s not why it’s valuable.”

He paused a little, breathing in. “So, this belonged to my Vovô. I, uh, I’ve never really met him because he died when I was two but he kinda never really died because we always mentioned him, if that makes sense.”

Kimiko nodded. “Go on.”

“Yeah, so he was an actor and he kinda did make it in Brazilian cinema. Like, as a presence, not a name”, Raimundo said. “But he never really got paid all that much so when he got his first big paycheck, he went out and got this medallion.”

He paused, sighing. “My Avó used to say I reminded her of him most, so she gave the medallion to me before I went with my dad to the circus. For good luck, you know.”

“So that’s a family heirloom”, Omi asked, gesturing to the medallion. “Passed from your grandfather to you?”

Raimundo nodded. “You could say that. You know, my Avó always said ‘_Ademar gave Raimundo two things—his medallion and his eyes_’.”

After a pause, he added redundantly. “My grandpa had green eyes.”

“Yeah, partner, we gathered that”, Clay said, nodding not unkindly. “So, I guess that’s that. Um, it didn’t really take too much but I, for one, am glad—”

“Clay, wait”, Kimiko said, smiling gleefully as she noticed there was something else was in the time-capsule, faintly showing its edges. “Guys, I cannot believe this. I was wondering where I put it, but I guess here it is!”

Holding up an old polaroid photo, Kimiko’s smile got bigger. “Who remembers this?”

Omi smiled too, once he saw the photo. “So, _that’s_ where this old thing went.”

In her hand, Kimiko was holding a photo the four teenagers had taken five years ago. By the way they were dressed and the distance they left between them, it was an easily pointed-out first day photo.

“I’m glad I hit my growth spurt”, Raimundo said, expression a cross between disgust and happiness as he grabbed the photo from his friend. “God, I was _short_.”

Clay took a look at the photo too. “At least you were presentable. Look at my face, I had a pimple right in the middle of my forehead!”

“I didn’t like any of you much that day, did I?”, Omi asked, pointing out the unwavering frown on his face.

Kimiko scoffed. “To be fair, none of us like you that much either. I don’t think we even liked each other and we were all outsiders.”

“I mean, I tried to be friendly with y’all but sheesh, you weren’t _having_ it”, Clay said, shrugging. “It’d have been easier to make friends with a mama wasp, I’ll tell you!”

“You’re right”, Raimundo said, oddly missing the point. “Kimiko was—”

Clay shot him a look. “I was including you in that, you know.”

“How _dare_ you”, the other boy said, dramatically gasping. “I was friendly the entire first day!”

Omi put a hand on his cheek. “You mean the first day when you pantsed me in front of the entire temple? That first day? Yes, you were _lovely_.”

“Gentle like summer breeze, that one”, Clay sarcastically agreed. “Bless his heart!”

Kimiko shot Raimundo a look, partially enjoying this, partially sympathetic. “Ever heard of 'pick your battles'? You were always a part of the Bitch Club, didn’t you know?”

“Sometimes I forget”, Raimundo said with a shrug. “For what it’s worth, my resentment of you all came from jealousy and…general distrust.”

As his friends chuckled and rolled their eyes, he added. “I mean, Omi, for example, couldn’t be more obnoxious. Swear to God, I couldn’t stand him and his god complex ass, like, you should have been grateful, I didn’t insult your entire bloodline on a daily basis.”

He paused again. “And Clay—way too _perfect_. Seeing you was like seeing a cardboard cutout of Clark Kent if he was a cowboy! And, to be honest, the accent was kinda irritating. Kiki—”

“I know, I know, you already told me”, Kimiko interrupted. “Stuck up rich girl with an annoyingly loud voice.”

She paused, raising an eyebrow. “You know what my first impression of you was, though? I saw you and I immediately thought dumb, already knows he’s pretty, and dickhead.”

“At the risk of getting burned”, Clay asked, curiously. “What about me?”

“I don’t know, like, I didn’t hate you”, Kimiko began. “But I couldn’t stand the accent…or the sayings…or the country music…or the saddle you kept in your section of the room...or you, like, in general.”

Omi’s eyes widened. “Me next, me next!”

“You”, she said, smiling. “Reminded me so much of my cousin Akira. He knew he was Ba-Ba’s favorite and he acted like it. Also, you were really nosy, like too nosy and I did catch you looking at me and my makeup and wig so judgmentally I just _had_ to be mean.”

“Okay”, Omi said, nodding earnestly. “My turn, I never really liked any of you—”

“We already established that, partner”, Clay said, amusement clear in his voice. “Unless you’re tryna tell us something?”

The youngest of the teenagers shook his head. “I was going to explain why. It’s simple really, I didn’t think any of you were fit warriors for the temple and I disliked the thought of not being that special anymore.”

A pause. “Also, Kimiko was rude, Raimundo was mean, and you were just plain strange, Clay. I mean, I don’t know what it was but I was on edge every time I heard your boots!”

Clay sighed. “You done?”

“Yeah.”

“Well then, I’m sharing my thoughts now”, Clay said, redundantly. “Omi, like it’s constantly mentioned, you were the nosiest creature I’d ever seen on God’s green earth, I swear on my Great-Nana Cathy’s grave!”

He paused. “And you—Kim, right before I went to the temple I’d been reading up on mythological demons, as one does, and I’d read terrible, horrible things about murders and people being tortured in all sorts of ways. Those pictures were the scariest thing I’d ever seen.”

Another pause. “And then, I met you, Kimiko. I mean, I didn’t know if you were gonna take me in or take me out. All I knew was you could shoot craps with the devil himself and win.”

“Aw”, Kimiko said, hand on her heart, oddly found that endearing. “That’s very sweet…I guess. I don’t know what to say.”

“You’re welcome”, Clay said, nodding. “As for Rai—honestly speaking, you’re an intimidating guy to get to know so I kept my distance. And then you pantsed Omi so I thought, well, that’s a snake in the grass if I'd ever seen one.”

He paused. “_Wow_, I wish we had better first impressions of each other.”

“I don’t know”, Raimundo said, not quite as insulted. “I don’t think we’d have been good friends without that first bump in the road.”

Omi nodded. “I agree, if we liked each other at first, we’d have definitely resented each other by the first month. And so far so good, right?”

“Well, it’s been five years, so I guess you're right”, Kimiko added. Pausing, she gave her friends several surprised looks as she, once again, repeated. “Five _whole_ years, guys. Can you believe it?”

Clay smiled. “We should do something special around the ten-year mark.”

“I suggest a rave”, Raimundo said, predictably. “Here. I’m telling you, Mount Song could be _the_ spot for parties.”

Scoffing lightheartedly at his friend, Omi’s expression drew blank as he thought of a question that often plagued him. Right now, with his friends, it seemed like there was no better time to share it, so he did.

“Hey, guys?”

“Yeah, O?”, Kimiko asked, giving him a concerned look at his tone.

“What do you think the future holds for us? Like, how do you think we’ll end up?”

Clay huffed, fanning himself with his hat. “Hitting us with the existential questions a little too early today, Omi."

A pause. “Look, I know it's not exactly what yer asking but I always reckoned I’d end up going into the biological field, maybe microbiology specifically…next to the temple, of course.”

“I can so see you doing that”, Kimiko said, nodding approvingly. “You and your fancy scientific definitions, like—”

“Well, before you relentlessly mock me, can you tell us what you’d wanna be, Kim?”

The girl shrugged. “Nothing near technology, if I could help it. Probably a fashion designer, or any other kind of designer. You guys already know I love art.”

“Same”, Omi said, giving her a smile. “But my art will be photography. I plan on being well-renowned and respected for my work, by the way. Just in case you guys want to name-drop me in the future.”

Raimundo snickered. “Your humility is a lesson to us all, Big Head.”

“Shut up”, the younger boy snapped. “But, wait, wait, tell us first what you want to be.”

When the boy in question said nothing, Omi glared. “Raimundo?”

“I don’t know, happy? I guess that works.”

“We all wanna be that too, partner”, Clay said, making a vague gesture. “But what do you wanna _do_, like, when you were a kid what did you want to be when you grew up?”

Raimundo shrugged before lying on the ground on his back. “I wanted to be on America’s Next Top Model.”

“_Rai_—”

“No, I’m serious”, the lounging boy insisted. “I was going to go on that show and be insanely popular, then I was going to marry a rich old white lady so I can voraciously live out a double-life with her money.”

A pause. “Don’t give me that look, I was made to be a trophy wife!”

“Well”, Clay said, rolling his eyes. “Realistically, what did you want to be?”

Raimundo shrugged before lying on the ground on his back. “Acting, singing maybe? I don’t know, you know. I can do a lot of things, like I can even play the piano—look, if it’s in performing, I’m doing it.”

Taking a moment to think, he said. "I think I'd probably be a radio host. I love sharing my hot takes and my mother already says I have the gift of the gab."

“So”, Kimiko began, taking an overlook of her circle. “A photographer, a designer, a microbiologist, and a radio host. I like it.”

“Me too!”, Omi said, smiling along before adding. “I’m happy none of you chose to go into business. That’s my _least_ favorite major.”

At that, Clay scrunched his nose. “Ugh, business-people are the worst! Don’t even get me started—”

And with that, the day continued on only to end as it began, with some teenagers with a couple of shovels, loud arguments, and a few memories. It was actually shaping up to be a blissful day, Omi thought. Well, until his friends started argument.

"You did _not_ just say I'd make a shitty trophy husband—Kimiko, take it back!"

Giving him a triumphant look, Clay tipped his hat. "Told ya."

_Well_, Omi thought. _You can't have everything_.


	16. A Casual Day on the Job (feat. Real Bloodthirsty Dragons)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So how does a regular day at work go by at the temple? Well...

_So there would be no escaping today_, Omi couldn’t help but think as he ducked and weaved and ran. There was no escape and there was nowhere to run to and, well, if this was how it ended then it was a pretty good run, wasn’t it?

If anyone had asked him how he expected today’s Wu hunt to go, Omi would have never expected—not in a million years—that it would end with him and his teammates trying to hide from literal dragons. But here they were.

“Hey! In here! In here—Omi!”

Following the sound of Clay’s yell, Omi mustered the last of his strengths and ran as fast as he could, bobbing and weaving through trees and darkness. When he finally made it to the medium-sized crevice, Clay pulled him in by the hand and checked him for injuries.

“I’m okay”, Omi protested, slapping away his friend’s concerned hand. “I’m okay. Where are Kimiko and Raimundo?”

Sitting deeper into the crevice, Kimiko answered, “Here.”

“Good”, Omi said, walking towards the fire, with Clay following him. “What the _hell_ was that?!”

Raimundo shushed him. “Jesus fucking Christ, keep it down!”

“Sorry”, the youngest Dragon said. “But what was that?”

“Dragons”, Clay said, shrugging. “Like, the actual kind.”

Omi gave him a look. “No, I know they were dragons. My question is why were they after us? Didn’t Dojo say dragons were over eating humans?”

“Maybe he meant over-eating”, Raimundo said, snorting. “As in the people who lived here ran out and now they’re starving.”

Even in the darkness, they could feel Kimiko’s condescending glare as she spoke. “Dojo said there were like 473 species of dragons. Maybe this is the species that eats humans.”

Pausing, she added bitterly, “And also somehow stops them from using fire.”

“Right”, Raimundo said, remembering the incident. He didn't know how he'd forgotten it. One second, a confident Kimiko was quite literally in her element going for the strike and the other, one of the dragons hit her and her fire wouldn't work anymore. “How are you doing? That must be rough.”

“It is”, she said. Though she couldn't describe it, she wouldn't have wished that on anyone else. It felt worse than anytime the Sun Chi Lantern was used on her. She couldn't think about it too hard though. Frowning, she turned to Clay, who suddenly had his index finger on her forehead.

“What the fuck do you think you're doing now?”

Clay barely shrugged. “Checking your _chi_.”

“…By putting your dirty finger on my forehead? Clay, I’m going to break out!”

“I mean, that’s better than not doing anything”, the cowboy said, carefully masking his annoyance.

The girl caught on anyway. “Oh, really? So, now I’m not doing anything—what the _fuck_ am I supposed to do, huh?”

“_Ugh_”, Raimundo said before Omi could intervene to mitigate. “Can you two shut up for like three seconds? Some of us have real problems here.”

Sharing a guilty look, the bickering pair mumbled their apologies, leaving a confused Omi.

“What’s wrong with you?”, he asked, squinting at his friend’s face. He seemed fine and would have been left unscathed if it weren’t for that head wound, an injury that had become all but commonplace for him now.

“Um, well”, Kimiko began before shaking her head and handing him a flashlight. “See for yourself.”

Curiously, Omi took the flashlight and shone it on Raimundo, who rolled his eyes and pointed down. Shining the light there, Omi made sure to not overreact. That was entirely too much blood. For the first time in a while, Omi was grateful they had the Rio Reverso safe and sound in the vault.

“What happened?”

“I tripped and now I can’t feel my leg.”

“Raimu—”

“No, I’m not joking, I tripped...and then one of the dragons hit me with its tail. Let me tell you, those tails are _not_ as soft as they look.”

Sighing, Omi sat back down, on the other side of Kimiko, and leaned back into the wall. Clay, who had been standing and not knowing what to do, sat and closed the circle.

They’d left the temple early in the morning and arrived to the forest in the middle of nowhere—not to be confused with the Forest of Nowhere—and, now, even though it was pitch-black outside, they were still not back. And he was tired. And hungry.

“Some day, huh?”, Clay asked, warming his hands over the fire. “And to think all I wanted was to get it over with so we can go home and I could watch that K-drama I told you about.”

Kimiko huffed. “I just wanted a nap.”

“And I want food”, Omi grumbled. “Did anyone bring anything?”

Raimundo nodded, barely. “I packed some chips, crackers, chocolate and some juice in Clay’s backpack, just in case.”

“I’ll deny I ever said this”, Omi began, reaching for Clay’s backpack. “But I love you.”

“Of course you do. I want some chips.”

“Catch!”

Although he was ready to catch the chips, Raimundo failed miserably, simply only watching as the bag fell just out of his reach. Still in the air, his hands twitched. “Yeah, I’m definitely losing it.”

“Consciousness?”, Kimiko asked, concerned.

“Yeah. Get the gauze from Clay’s bag.”

“I told you”, she said, snatching the bag from the cowboy’s hand. “I told you we have to clean that first. I told you head trauma is always serious but do you listen to me—_do_ _you_?”

Pausing, she took some gauze and a pair of tweezers out before putting the bag to the side. She handed Clay the flashlight and he shone it, immediately knowing what to do.

“If you discover you lost your last remaining brain cell, don’t come crying to me.”

Sighing, Clay shared a worried look with Omi, who nervously bit his lips. As a leader, Raimundo had very few rules but among the ones he did, there was one rule no one on the team liked.

If he were injured, seriously or not, he wouldn’t use their medical supplies until they checked if anyone needed it first. He wouldn’t hear any of their protests either. When they tried vetoing it because it was stupid and careless, Raimundo had actually said the words “no discussion” and meant it.

“Wait, wait”, Raimundo said, after Kimiko was done using the tweezers to snatch splinters and debris. “Injury report.”

Clay sighed. “I got a few cuts and a sprained ankle, Kimiko has her chi blocked, and Omi’s got a few cuts too. Nothing serious.”

Sighing, he added, “Just take the fucking gauze before I strangle you with it, Rai.”

“Fine”, Raimundo said, taking the gauze from Kimiko and pressing it to his head. “_God_, my head hurts. I wish we had alcohol.”

“Partner, y’know that actually harms the cells trying to—”

“I meant to drink, Hick Steve Irwin.”

“Bless your heart”, Clay said, throwing his friend a look. “But I’m glad to see you’re not dead yet.”

Kimiko sighed and crossed and uncrossed her arms. “That’s a miracle, right? He never pays attention where he’s going—it’s all circus this and circus that and like zero agility to show for it.”

“_You_ don’t get to say that”, Raimundo said, snorting. “Guys, you didn’t see it but old girl here thought she could take on a dragon while taking a _phone_ _call_.”

She glared. “I was already on the phone when it attacked me, how was I supposed to predict I wasn’t alone—I’m not psychic.”

Digging into her pocket like she remembered something, she took out her phone and sucked her teeth. “I’m gonna need a new phone. Look at this, _look_! The screen is all cracked and I'm positive someone's blood is on there.”

“Does it still work, though?”, Clay asked. "If it does, maybe you should count your blessings."

“Huh, it does”, Kimiko said, a little surprised when she tried. “And I got two bars.”

“Try calling Master Fung”, Omi suggested. “Tell him we’re camping out today.”

“Okay”, she said, dialing the number before pressing her phone to her ear. “I’m gonna tell him we need the infirmary ready and that we need about three days off after this.”

The youngest warrior sighed. “Make them four.”

“Will do.”

A pause. “Hey, Master Fung. Yes, yeah, we’re okay—well, kinda. Rai’s got a serious head wound but we’re taking care of it until we get back—yeah, we’ll need the infirmary ready and the Rio Reverso probably and if we can get the—yes, _exactly_.”

Another pause. “Master F—yeah, right, don’t worry, we have food and everything and we have—yes, Master Fung, we’re okay, would I lie to you? We have the Wu, by the way and—”

Rolling her eyes, Kimiko sighed and took the phone away from her ear until the old man was finished before putting it back. “Yes, totally, Master Fung. Hey, before I hang up, did you know this area’s, like, full of starving bloodthirsty dragons?”

“Oh my”, Raimundo said, in a near-accurate impression of Master Fung’s voice. With his free hand, he pretended to stroke a beard that was not there. “And Dojo did not tell you, Young Dragon?”

While the other two boys laughed, a glaring Kimiko muttered into the phone. “No, he didn’t tell us, Master Fung.”

She paused. “Is he at the temple, by the way? We kinda lost him while we were running for our lives and—oh, he’s _still_ out there, well—oh, okay. Yeah, we’re waiting in this crevice, what else can we do?”

Another pause. “Okay, bye.”

“What?”, Omi asked, curiously. “What did he say?”

“He said Dojo didn’t know that there were dragons still in this forest”, Kimiko said. “Apparently, the ones here are a rogue group, kinda like outlaws in their own species and they’re not friendly.”

Clay scoffed. “That’s an understatement. And what’s Dojo going to do, you said he’s still out here.”

“Yeah”, she said. “Dojo’s actually trying to drag them out of the forest by pretending there’s a big dragon event happening—when he does that, we can sneak out.”

“We should have brought the Tiger Claws with us”, Clay said, sighing exasperatedly. “I know we should have but I thought ‘hey, what’s the worst that could happen?’ and I’m an idiot.”

Omi leaned forward to put his friend on the shoulder. “Hey, you couldn’t have known we’d be in this situation. Don’t beat yourself up.”

“Well, now I’m _definitely_ hallucinating”, Raimundo said, smirking. “See, Kimiko? Omi just comforted Clay without giving him a metaphorical kick in the balls.”

“I’m not an asshole, Raimundo”, Omi retorted. “This was never a situation we had to worry about because Dojo didn’t tell us about human-eating dragons being out there. If it is and this was sheer incompetence then, maybe, I’d have said something else but it isn’t.”

“And he’s back”, Clay said, chuckling a little. “We missed you, buddy. All that quiet just ain’t you.”

Omi sighed. “I was just…processing what happened. Something very weird happened to me when I was trying to hide from the dragons. I couldn’t find you guys anywhere and then there was all that screaming and fire—”

He paused, taking a breath. “I just couldn’t breathe suddenly and, and I didn’t know what to do because with all my water powers, there’s only one me and hundreds of them and—and then I got this pain right here in my chest and it hurt so much, I thought I was having a heart attack.”

Another pause. “But I’m fine now, so that wasn’t at all fun.”

“O, you do know that was a panic attack, right?”, Kimiko asked, concernedly. “Are you okay?”

Omi shrugged. “I’m over it.”

“No”, the girl said. “Listen to me, the next time this happens you should practice your breathing techniques and try to find a focus object.”

“That helps?”

“It helps with me.”

“I will keep it in mind then”, Omi said, sighing and nodding until she looked away. “This day is going to haunt me, just so you all know.”

“No offense but if it didn’t then we’d all know something’s wrong with you, partner”, Clay said. “That was just plain terrifying. Did y'all see how they just ran at us all at once like that? And, _good God_, why do they scream like pterodactyls?”

Raimundo clicked his tongue. “Don’t know but I’ll be having nightmares about it for a very long time. I didn’t think I’d be the type to be scared of dragons after all this time but here we are!”

Snorting a little, Kimiko reached out and almost flicked the boy in the ear before remembering the gauze he was still pressing to his head and backed off. For a few minutes, that was the last thing that happened in the crevice.

At least, until Omi, nervous and needing a distraction, decided to ask a question that had been plaguing him since the last time someone used the Shadow of Fear against them. He'd been thinking about that incident ever since then and he couldn't seem to shake it off, even in the worst moments. Today, that'd been his last coherent thought right before "_survive_" when those dragons attacked. 

“What are you guys scared of?”

Kimiko crossed her arms. “Well, you know. Creepy half-burnt dolls, geese, badly done roots, unnatural patterns—ugh, those creep me out so much.”

“Yeah, I’m with her on the geese thing”, Clay said, nodding. “You have not seen a goose with a vengeance, partner. That bird will jump you quicker than grease on a hot skillet!”

Omi raised an eyebrow before shaking his head. “No, not that. I meant, like real fears, like the things you fear now, like—Raimundo, I’m using you as an example.”

Said boy barely sighed. “Always a pleasure.”

“Anyway”, Omi continued. “Like, remember back then? When we had the Shadow of Fear used on us, Raimundo’s fear was jellyfish, right? Well, now it’s some old man walking with a cane.”

A pause. “And you two, your fears changed too and I saw that. So, what are you guys scared of? Tell me.”

Sighing, Clay looked Omi in the eye for a second before starting to speak, “You saw another cowboy last time, right? About my height and build?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s me, I think”, Clay said, shrugging. “Every now and then I just, I don’t feel like I’m right, you know? I feel like I’m not where I’m supposed to be, like I’m supposed to be in the ranch back at Texas and that’s it. I just feel like maybe there was a mistake and we were all too late realizing it.”

“So, like an imposter?”, Raimundo asked.

“Exactly that. I feel like I’m pretending to be someone better and I don’t actually know poo from apple butter.”

Kimiko shrugged. “My thing is I’m always followed by all these sad women, right? You saw them. Those women, they’re my family. My grandmother, my aunts, my, uh, my mother—they’re all there because I’m scared I’ll make the same mistakes they all did.”

Pausing, she gave the boys a small smile. “Generational trauma. Too deep?”

“Yeah”, Clay said, sympathetically. “I’m sure your aunts are lovelier in real life.”

“Actually, those demons with the fangs were probably nicer. Eh, what can you do? Rai?”

“Right, my turn”, Raimundo said. “I’m scared of dying alone because I’ll drive everyone I love away with my bullshit. _Next_!”

They all set their eye-sights on Omi next. After a beat, though, he’d realized they were expecting his answer.

“Oh right”, Omi began, a little embarrassed. “I don’t know.”

“Partner, c’mon! We all shared, you have to too!”

“You heard the cowboy, Omi. No need to be shy; we’ve seen you in worse situations.”

Glaring a little before sighing and shutting his eyes, Omi shrugged. “No, but I really don’t know. Don’t get me wrong, I still find squirrels…horrifying, but lately I’ve—I’ve been thinking there are a lot of scarier things.”

A pause. “Sometimes, I think about my parents, you know. I’ve always wanted to know who they were but what if they were horrible people and I was better off not knowing?”

Another pause. “And sometimes, it’s failure. Before you say it, I know—everyone has to fail some time but what if—sometimes failure can cause things like the end of the world or a thousand years of darkness and I don’t want that.”

“No one does”, Raimundo awkwardly said.

Omi sighed. “Sometimes, I think maybe I’m afraid of other things, like, like dying or being alone but I just don’t really know.”

That, sadly, was not a lie and everyone in the crevice knew it. The last time Jack had used the Shadow of Fear against them, he’d only managed to hit three out of four Dragons. When he re-aimed the Wu for Omi, who’d stood still with his eyes on the Wu in an uncharacteristic moment of freezing, Dojo intervened and snatched the youngest warrior out of the line of fire with his giant tail.

It wasn’t something Omi wanted to discuss back then and, now, it made a lot of sense why.

“I think you usually take some time to figure out what truly scares you, you know”, Kimiko began, clearing her throat. “I didn’t know what really scared me until I started hating every time someone compared me to my mom or one of my aunts.”

Face growing uncomfortable, she paused. “Because I knew that they all made mistakes and their mistakes made my life difficult. And I don’t know if I choose things because I want to or…because I just want to avoid some things so badly.”

“Well”, Clay said, awkward and pleasant. “This got dark.”

Raimundo clicked his teeth and agreed. “Yeah. Hey, Clay, look at me, look at me!”

Squinting, Clay did as he was told only for Raimundo to shine the flashlight he yanked from Kimiko directly into the other boy’s eyes. “_Bitch_!”

“Jesus, what the _fuck_, Raimundo!”

Shielding his pained eyes, Clay grunted. “You must think you’re slicker than a boiled onion for that one. Just know I was too tired to argue and that’s the _only_ reason why I fell into it and—”

“Oh no, not that”, Raimundo said, already cackling. “You’re just gullible as fuck. Like what did you think was gonna happen? _Idiot_!”

Though he laughed at the exchange like the others did, Omi knew it was meant as subtle distraction from the original topic. He’d seen Kimiko’s growing discomfort as she spoke so he didn’t need to catch her relieved glance or Raimundo’s forget-about-it smile to confirm it.

While pretending to look away, though, Omi accidentally caught Clay’s eyes, which immediately took on a look of concern. Omi insistently shook his head to wave it off.

Seeing that, Kimiko gave Omi a side-hug, which he readily accepted. Dark cervices like this needed something more like that and less than talks about Serious Things.

So, they didn’t talk about serious things. They talked about stupid stuff, though.

Kimiko went on at length about Keiko’s upcoming visit and how she wanted everyone to be on their best behavior—_hear that Rai_—and Clay mentioned that he was taking two days off to visit the ranch.

Omi talked about a book of Clay’s he was reading and how interesting it was getting—_there’s just a lot going on_—and Raimundo said he was only a step away from convincing Master Fung to get them a cat, sparking a debate from hell whether dogs or cats made better pets.

So far, Team Dog (Kimiko and Clay) were making several points Team Cat (Omi and Raimundo) couldn’t compare to. That is, until Clay went on an important tangent.

“Let’s just hope we live to continue this argument outside”, Clay said, trying to pass off his morbidity as sarcasm. “Y’all think Dojo is gonna make it, right? Any minute now.”

Sharing a look with the other two, Kimiko shrugged and sighed. “If that gecko fails, I’m _so_ coming back to haunt the shit out of him.”

Exactly a minute after her threat, a great noise the Dragons knew all too well came nearer and nearer to the crevice. It sounded like scales and claws and a temple guardian they all knew and loved, now in giant form.

“Kids”, Dojo shouted, voice echoing down the crevice. “I’m here, let’s get the hell out before they come back!”

Sighing, Omi gave Kimiko a look. “You should’ve threatened him hours ago.”

“I heard that!”

“Good”, Clay said, hands on his hips. He’d bent down and wore his backpack and was now ready to go, giving Kimiko a look.

“You go right”, she said, huffing. “I’ll go left.”

Watching as Kimiko and Clay each half-carried an injured yet stubborn Raimundo out of the crevice, Omi checked the ground for the Wu. A ring that changed personal temperament. A small price to pay for all their troubles.

Omi had forgotten about it even though it was the entire reason for this trip. And he didn’t care that he forgot, which made him feel uneasy. But then again, with forests in the middle of nowhere, bloodthirsty dragons and one half-finished conversation with his friends in dark crevices, one literal mood ring didn’t really matter.


	17. Raimundo Revisits His Childhood

“—no, no, no”, Clay was yelling, cupping his hands for a microphone effect from the elevated rocky sidelines. “That ain’t one bit right, Kim. If you keep it like that, you’ll—”

With one final crash and one final rush of a heli-bot engine, the Fire Dragon fell off her live-monkey bar track—a very long, no context needed story—as did Wuya when Jack Kazusu Atom-ed her on his way to the finish line.

“_Ha_! Eat my dust, losers!”

As Omi rolled his eyes, Raimundo got off his rocky seat and dusted his jeans. Dojo gave him a questioning look, to which the boy shrugged.

“Someone’s gonna have to catch her”, Raimundo said. “Concussed Kimiko is the _worst_ Kimiko.”

Clay clicked his tongue. “Be careful then. Last time you did that, _you_ got a concussion, partner!”

“Will do”, the flying boy said as he took off, keeping a steady pace. As he flew, Jack had finally reached the Wu at the end of the tunnel, the Shouxing Mirror.

Clay leaned back into his seat, crossing his arms behind his head and enjoying the view. The showdown was over but the rocky sidelines were sure taking their sweet time reverting back to normal. If anything else, the cowboy thought he could enjoy the quasi-psychedelic view.

Omi, on the other hand, was quite pissed off. He’d woken up grumpy, which happened more and more often every day, so he wasn’t in the mood for more grievances. And losing the Shouxing Mirror to Jack Spicer was a grievance. Omi would have honestly taken a loss against the Heylin Witch, at least.

Speaking of the Heylin witch, she’d gotten up and dusted her dress before sighing and fixing her arm back in position, a somehow non-magical quality she had that never stopped being creepy.

Still holding the small mirror in the middle of the rocky valley, Jack Spicer’s mouth froze on the large shit-eating grin he had once he won. No one was looking at him, no one had spared him one look and _he_ was the one with the Wu!

_It’s_ _like_, Jack thought, smile vanishing as he lowered his arms. _They_ _don’t_ _even_ _care_. Something very painful and frankly rude for him to admit. It wasn’t like they were even nemeses anymore.

Increasingly livid, Jack pouted and did the exact same thing he’d do every time he wanted attention. He prepared to cause a scene. Jack took a look at the mirror before setting his eyesight on the flying figures of Raimundo and his earlier competition, Kimiko.

They were chatting calmly as the former stopped mid-air before spinning them around and continuing his descent. Great, Jack thought. He was showing off now and no one cared about the mirror. Well, he’d show them.

“It’s about time”, Jack began, his voice loud and nasally. “You all began to show me some respect. I won and I demand a fucking moment to gloat!”

As the monks and the dragon on the now stable ground and the witch turned as well as the flying monks above, Jack smiled sinisterly.

“You’ll rue the day, losers! Shouxing Mirror—”

Before Jack was halfway done with his invocation, Omi gave his friend a warning yell. “Kimiko, look out! He’s aiming for you!”

And look out, Kimiko did. Sadly, since she’d maneuvered her way out of the Wu’s shot, she’d also accidentally maneuvered her way out of her friend’s grip and began a long fall down.

“Shit, shit, shit”, Raimundo cursed before he swooped down to catch the girl. Maybe he should’ve gotten her down first _before_ he showed off. “I’m coming for you!”

The minute Raimundo caught Kimiko, though, he shielded her from a very much solid ground and something far more dangerous. A very real Shouxing Mirror ray that caught him in the back instead.

Thrown apart from her friend by the force of the ray, Kimiko used her reflexes to stick a perfect landing. She shared a quick look with Omi and Clay before they ran to check on Raimundo, fallen in a cloud of sand and rocks.

Crossing her arms, Wuya leaned against a big rock and observed. Something was off about the Wind Dragon’s aura and she didn’t like that one bit. Glimpsing the worried look on Dojo’s face, she knew her intuition wasn’t off-point.

“Raimundo”, the dragon called, nearly flying off Clay’s shoulder as the boy ran. “Are you okay?”

Hearing a faint grunt, Kimiko hurried her sprint before noticing Omi’s languid jog. “For Dashi’s sake, Omi, show some emotion. Our friend was hit by the Shouxing Mirror and probably broke his brain on the way down!”

“And what does the Shouxing Mirror do, Kimiko”, Omi began, relaxed as can be. “Doesn’t it simply age a person? I, for one, honestly think Old Raimundo is fun to hang out with. He’s like the grandfather I never had.”

“Right”, Clay said, passing Omi by. “You met _that_ him before. I forget that happened.”

Kimiko sighed. “Well, maybe he’d be more mature then. Raimundo, Rai—are you okay?!”

Another grunted reply. The three teenagers and their dragon shared a look as they reached the boy. Now that the cloud of sand had cleared, they all got a clear view of what happened to Raimundo.

And as Wuya sneakily approached, she got a good view too. Raimundo hadn’t aged and became an old man. On the contrary, he was actually quite young. About ten years younger.

This Raimundo, who couldn’t be more than seven or eight, was much shorter than he was a few seconds ago. He was still wearing the same clothes, though they were now seas his tiny self was swimming in. His curly hair had outgrown its fade but, oddly enough, his eyebrows were still the same.

If Clay didn’t know any better, he’d have called that little ankle-biter precious.

“Oh my stars and garters”, Clay soon began, taking his hat off his head. “Y’all, we hung the wrong horse thief! What the hell happened to Raimundo?”

As Kimiko and Omi slowly approached the now-young boy, Wuya couldn’t help but cackle victoriously. They didn’t even have a clue!

“There are settings on the Shouxing Mirror, you idiots”, Wuya said, hands on her hips. “And Jack used one the lowest. What, didn’t your dragon tell you?”

“No”, Clay said, shrugging before glaring at Dojo on his shoulder. “No, he didn’t.”

“I’m sorry, okay? It slipped my mind! Do you have any idea how _many_ Wu Dashi created? That man had _way_ too much free time on his hands!”

“We all know that”, Wuya said, smirking at Clay. “Aren’t you going to check on your…little pal?”

The minute the witch said that, a loud yell sounded across the valley, echoing as it went.

“Ow, _son of a bitch_”, Kimiko said, yanking her hair out of the little boy’s grip. “What the hell, did I even do anything but try to help you?”

Raising an eyebrow, Clay noticed Omi’s sputtering laughs before noticing little Raimundo’s fighting stance.

“What if you _were_ about to do something to me?”, Raimundo said, voice still noticeable if not a few octaves higher. “My Pai told me all about Stranger Danger—he said I have to look out for myself!”

Omi shot Clay a look before turning to the kid. “Stranger Danger? Raimundo, don’t you remember us?”

“I don’t know you”, Raimundo said, scowling. “I’ve never met you in my life. Ever.”

“We’re your friends, you little twerp”, Kimiko said, still seething. “You had a little accident and that’s why you can’t remember.”

Raimundo crossed his arms. “Sounds like something a child kidnapper would say. Nice try, Auntie.”

“_Auntie_?”, Kimiko said, hand shooting to her heart. “Did you just call me Aunt—”

Dojo took that as a moment to intervene, instantly capturing the boy’s interest with all the flying. “Raimundo, do you—”

“You’re a dragon?”, the boy said, jaw dropping in fascination. “That’s what you are, right? You’re not, like, a talking chameleon or anything?”

Dojo crossed his claws. “No, I’m not. I _am_ a dragon, a temple guardian dragon, and you’re the Dragon of the Wind. You _did_ have an accident, which is why you can’t remember this.”

Looking from the talking lizard-dragon to the tall redheaded woman with no shoes to the three teenagers with fancy gadgets in their hands, little Raimundo found that he may as well believe them. No one with a talking dragon had a reason to lie about anything.

“Yeah, okay”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “Sure.”

“Cool”, Clay began, still having trouble processing his friend has now shrunken back to childhood. “Let’s, uh, let’s move out and head back home so we can figure this whole thing—”

“Raimundo”, Wuya began, smiling warmly as she walked closer to the boy. “I’m Auntie Wuya. You don’t remember me, do you?”

“No?”

“That’s okay”, the witch said, still beaming. “How old are you now?”

Raimundo gave her a look. “I turned seven in October.”

“_Ugh_”, Clay couldn’t help but muttering to Kimiko. All that came to mind now was his little cousin Kayleigh and all her evil little ways. “Seven year-olds are worse than yellowjackets with a vengeance.”

Kimiko nodded. “Tell me about it. Who’s your nightmare? Mine’s my cousin Junji.”

“My cousin Kayleigh. She used to—”

“Raimundo”, Wuya began in a loud voice, bending down to the boy’s level. She felt glad she still remembered what that boy had told her about his life when he was her apprentice.

She took a moment to pause, adding a bright smile. “Don’t you want to be rich when you grow up?”

“Everyone does”, the little boy said, raising an eyebrow. “With enough money, you can buy _everything_. Don’t you know that?”

“You know what, you and I go way back. And I’ve promised you many times that—"

“For Dashi’s sake”, Omi muttered, shooting his other friends a look as the witch droned on. “She’s so insolent, trying to recruit him like that. He doesn’t remember anything!”

Dojo sighed. “I’d say that’s the point, Omi. But we can’t let that happen. Remember last time? She ruled the world in a day and half and now that he’s seven, who knows where that chaotic energy will lead us?”

“Oh, don’t worry”, Kimiko said, squaring her shoulder before making her move. “It’s so not going to happen.”

Kimiko took a few steps in little Raimundo and Wuya’s direction, arms crossed. Once there, the girl didn’t try Wuya’s approach by smiling and impersonating someone’s fairy godmother. No, Kimiko went in for the kill.

“I’m calling your mom”, she said, trying not to sound as whiny as she felt. “That’s right, Raimundo, I _know_ her and I have her on speed dial.”

The boy blanched for a second before frowning. “You’re lying.”

“Oh, am I? Try me, little boy. I’m calling your mom and I’ll tell her everything you did, including the disrespect. You’ll be grounded—no phone, no TV, no internet, no _nothing_.”

“I don’t even care, go fix your edges, knockoff Sailor Moon. I can have fun without any—”

“No football”, Kimiko said, smoothing down her blonde wig. Figures that little twerp would immediately zero in on the unnoticeable. “No going out. In fact, you won’t leave your room except to pee. How about that?”

Turning to look at Wuya, as if the witch will save him, Raimundo pouted and played up the puppy dog eyes, making Omi involuntarily scoff.

“Ignore her”, Wuya said, looking the kid in the eye. “If you come with me, you’ll have everything you want. Every game, every toy, every candy—you will even have the World Cup if you want it.”

Meanwhile, Kimiko cleared her throat and made a show of unlocking her phone and typing out the kid’s mother’s number. “I’m giving you ten seconds before I call.”

Looking from the witch to the teenage girl with the phone, little Raimundo seemed more lost than he’d ever been. He turned his pouts on the others, only to see Clay shielding his eyes and Omi giving him the stank eye.

“It’s never worked on me”, Omi said, hands on his waist. “It won’t work now. Make your decision, Raimundo.”

“But I don’t know”, Raimundo said, exasperatedly. He lied; he knew exactly where he wanted to go but if he did, the mean girl with the twin pigtails would call his mom to tell on him. She seemed to be the kind of person people believed and were scared of.

Sighing, the seven year-old knew what he’d finally say. “I won’t choose.”

“What?”, Wuya asked, surprised. “Why?”

“Because”, Raimundo said. “You’re both strangers, so I won’t choose.”

Kimiko gave him a look. “What, you really won’t choose or are you scared to choose?”

“I’m not scared! I’ve never been scared of anything!”

“Sure”, Kimiko said, unconvinced. “Well, I’m sorry, Wuya. He can’t choose, so we’ll be leaving now.”

Wuya put her hands on her hips. “And who said him not choosing meant you won by default?”

“He did come in here with us”, Clay pointed out. “That gives us the advantage.”

“Yes, but he didn’t choose and you’re not giving him a fair chance to choose.”

Omi furrowed his eyebrows. “What are you suggesting?”

“Nothing”, Wuya said, shrugging. “Simply a fair chance for little Raimundo to choose. You Xiaolin love your fairness, don’t you?”

“Even if we do”, Kimiko aggressively began. “You really think we’re giving a seven year-old to a _witch_? Are you out of your fucking—”

“Kimiko”, Omi interrupted. “She’s right. We can’t take Raimundo back with us if he does not choose us. We’d be forcing him to do something he doesn’t want to do—that’s not the Xiaolin way.”

Kimiko was speechless for all of three seconds. “Fuck the Xiaolin Way! What honor code will be following if we let him go with her?”

“We won’t be”, Omi shrugged.

“Partner”, Clay said. “What are you saying?”

“We do what Wuya said”, Omi said. “We let Raimundo choose _but_ first we let him _see_ what he’d be choosing.”

Dojo scratched his red beard. “That’s actually genius, Omi.”

“It is?”, Clay asked. “Wouldn’t Raimundo be too impressionable at this age?”

At that, the kid threw the cowboy a dirty look Dojo didn’t notice before he answered.

“Yes”, the dragon said, answering Clay’s question and getting a worse glare from the angry kid. “But he was also pretty impressionable at thirteen, so we’ll just have to wing it.”

With an agreement finally reached, the gang and the witch turned to the kid, who vehemently shook his head.

“Yeah, nice try”, Raimundo said. “You can wing it all you want but I’m not going anywhere. Auntie over there will still tell my mom on me.”

“What?”, Kimiko said, as all eyes trailed to her. “I won’t.”

Raimundo was adamant. “Prove it.”

“No”, the girl said, scoffing as she shared disbelief with her friends. “Can you guys believe this little—”

Dojo sighed. “Just do it, Kimiko. Let’s get this over with.”

Sighing, Kimiko unlocked her phone again and went to phone-log. Scrolling through the list, her fingers hovered over Raimundo’s mother’s number before she dialed.

After a few beeps, she heard a voice. “_Olá_, Kimiko. How’s it going, something wrong?”

“_Olá_, _senhora_”, Kimiko began, as charmingly as possible. “No, no, everything’s fine. One little problem, though. It’s a funny story…”

* * *

It turned out Auntie Iolanda, Raimundo’s mother, didn’t find Kimiko’s little anecdote at all funny. If anything, the woman was more than a little peeved and Kimiko couldn’t really blame her.

“So, he wakes up one day and goes evil”, the woman had been ranting to Kimiko on the phone. “And then he wrecks the world. He’s always in danger, he’s been possessed once and almost body-snatched, and now you tell me my baby is now an _actual_ baby?”

A pause. “Just what the fuck?!”

_What the fuck indeed_, Kimiko thought. They were only lucky the woman gave the whole experiment her blessing before hanging up. Now, the Xiaolin warriors and Wuya, one of their immortal nemeses, could freely fight over a kid’s allegiance, each taking him in one day at a time.

Of all their reactions to Raimundo’s de-aging, though, Master Fung’s reaction was the one that stuck with her the most.

When she and Omi grabbed the kid by the hands and practically ran with him to the tearoom where Master Fung was, all he did was glance up from his tea and current book, then immediately shut his eyes in a resigned pre-migraine expression.

“What happened?”

“Jack Spicer hit him with the Shouxing Mirror”, Omi began. “And, well, we kinda made a deal with Wuya. See, Master Fung, we…”

Naturally, the end result to that conversation was Master Fung being understanding, offering advice, and barely holding in his exasperation with the situation. Thankfully, not without giving them his blessing and telling them to _try_ to not destroy the temple this time.

Even with all this wobbly support, Kimiko didn’t really think things were going well in their favor so far. She’d been standing the doorless doorway for a while now, observing Clay trying to teach Raimundo some meditation.

“So you just gotta take a deep breath”, Clay was saying, seating adjusting. “And you gotta let your mind go.”

Though he was sitting adjusted too, Raimundo snickered. “I bet you don’t find that hard.”

“And I bet your momma should’ve taught you some manners, you little sh—rascal”, Clay said, trying to keep his tone friendly. Oddly, Kimiko found that more disturbing. “Now, try what I taught you.”

“You didn’t teach me shit.”

“_Language_!”

“According to you”, little Raimundo condescendingly began. “We’re, like, the same age. I can curse if I want to.”

Clay gave him a look. “And you said you were seven. Mind your manners _or_ _else_.”

“Or else what?”

“You’ll be grounded”, the cowboy pleasantly began. “And you could seriously use it.”

Raimundo got off the ground, grumbled in Portuguese, and gave Clay a glare before flipping him off and walking away.

“Where are ya going, little fella”, Clay said, annoyedly, getting off the ground himself. “We’re not done here—we haven’t even gotten to the second set of f—”

“Fuck you”, little Raimundo said, waving the teenager off as he passed Kimiko without a second glance on the way out. “And fuck this temple, the minute _tia_ with the red hair gets here, I’m leaving and I’m never coming back!”

“Well”, Kimiko said, giving Clay a polite smile as he made his way to the doorless doorway where she stood. “That was a disaster.”

“Disaster doesn’t cover it, Kim”, Clay said, crossing his arms. “This is worst than the time I told Jessie she could eat off the food display at Ikea and she got food poisoning because it was all plastic.”

A pause. “This, this is going to bite us in the ass.”

“Rai kinda just said he was going to go Heylin”, Kimiko said. “So, yeah, I’m with you on that.”

Turning sideways to give him a condescending look, she shrugged. “But that’s your fault, you know.”

“My fault?”, Clay asked, incredulously pointing at himself like he didn’t believe it. “How’s that my fault?”

Kimiko huffed. “You have to be patient with kids. Look, seven year-olds are too much for me too but I’m _not_ going to go off at them like you just did!”

“Don’t you think I know that?”, Clay said, rolling his eyes. “I was trying so hard to be friendly and understanding but that kid—that kid finds new ways to get on your every nerve.”

“Still—”

“Look, it’s not as easy as it looks, okay!”

“Oh, so now you’re yelling at _me_”, Kimiko began, scoffing. “We may have something to thank this little exercise for, Clay. At least now we know you need anger management classes.”

“Well, hi there, Pot”, Clay snorted. “Long time no see, it’s _Kettle_!”

Kimiko did not dignify that with an answer and crossed her arms before uncrossing them and deciding to actually go and do something about this whole situation.

Raising an eyebrow at her squared shoulders, Clay sighed as he watched his friend go, probably about to do something reckless and unthought-through all at once.

Stomping through the hallways, Kimiko trekked until she found her target, the de-aged warrior sulking in the kitchen. Standing in the doorway, she took a deep breath before going in and putting her hands on her hips.

“What”, Raimundo said, giving her a look. “What do you want?”

Kimiko tried for a smile. “You’re coming with me for a new lesson.”

“Ugh, no”, the kid said, looking disgusted. “I had enough of this monk school.”

“No, you really didn’t. I think you know the drill, come with me _or_….”

“Oh my God, how do you even _know_ my mom?!”

Two minutes later, Kimiko and de-aged Raimundo were at the scroll room, where the former had taken out a bunch of history scrolls and laid them out on the little table they both sat at.

“So, these scrolls have everything”, she began, smirking confidently. “And I mean _everything_ you need to know about Xiaolin history and this temple.”

Raimundo wasn’t impressed. “Cool.”

“It _is_”, Kimiko emphasized with a soft glare. “So, a long time ago—”

“How long?”

“Like two thousand years ago. If you interrupt me again, you go to bed early. Okay?”

As Kimiko explained more and more Xiaolin history, she realized one thing she’d already subconsciously known. Teaching Raimundo anything, at any age, was a job from hell if he wasn’t interested in hearing it.

She told him how the Xiaolin-Heylin conflict began and stressed on how the Heylin were not the good guys. She mentioned how the Dragons came into being and what their missions were and told him all about the Dashi saga, Chase Young, Wuya. And, yes, even, Master Monk Guan.

“Yeah, I don’t get it”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “That Dashi dude sounds like a jerk. Maybe if he and his little buddies talked first, this whole thing could have been avoided.”

That whole thing, of course, being Chase Young’s drinking the infamous soup and joining the Heylin. Kimiko crossed her arms.

“I’m pretty sure this came after a lot of conversations. That’s a big decision to make just because you’re mad at someone.”

“Still, that Dashi dude sounds like a pretty bad listener. It’s like when you talk to your dad and he’s all like ‘yeah, sure, I hear you’ and he’s not listening _at_ _all_.”

Kimiko sighed. They were getting nowhere like this but she’d be damned if Clay proved her wrong. “Well, regardless of what happened, here’s a simple equation—Xiaolin, good. Heylin, bad. Okay?”

“But how can I know good and bad if I don’t see for myself? That’s stupid.”

“You’re—never mind.”

Fuming on the inside, Kimiko tried reigning her anger in. It wasn’t his fault, she reminded herself. With that de-aging, he’d forgotten damn near everything so obviously he wouldn’t remember ever switching sides.

The rest of the ‘lesson’ went on in this very same way. Raimundo didn’t understand why he was expected to wear the same outfit as everyone else. And then he didn’t get why everything always lead to a thousand years of darkness. And then he didn’t understand why Master Monk Guan was called Master Monk because it sounded too much.

But that was not all. He was adamant about not reading the scrolls—he just didn’t want to. He thought some of the Wu were fun and were useful for pranks, describing ones that seemed entirely too ridiculous for Kimiko’s liking.

He didn’t think Wuya was _that_ bad. And he didn’t think there was any point in constantly fighting the Heylin.

“We could do a big fight at the end of every year”, the seven year-old excitedly said. “It’d be an all-out, winner-takes-it-all, and then whoever wins gets to brag about it until the next one—just like Copa Libertadores!”

Kimiko humored him. “And what if we lose that fight? What then?”

“We make it up in the second-leg”, Raimundo said with a shrug. “Those are the best finals.”

Cursing under her breath, Kimiko got off her seat. Nope, no, she couldn’t do it. Clay could have all the ‘_I told you so_’s he wanted—she was out.

“Hey, hey, where are you going?”

Kimiko didn’t bother looking. “To my room. I _need_ a nap.”

Watching as the perpetually pissed off girl left, de-aged Raimundo shrugged before taking another look at the scrolls. Too much paper for not so many words, he couldn’t help but think.

Before he could decide what he wanted to do next, though, someone came into the room. The short bald kid who was friends with the other two.

“Oh, I’m sorry”, Omi said, doing a double-take. “I didn’t know anyone was here. Did you come here by yourself?”

“No”, Raimundo said, scoffing. “Why would I? This place is full of dusty old essays.”

The now-older boy shrugged. “It’s just that whenever we couldn’t find you, back when you weren’t seven, we’d always find you here, you know.”

“Really?”, the kid asked, scrunching his nose. “Why?”

“I don’t know, honestly. Sometimes you said you found interesting stuff.”

A pause. “I know you must be feeling weird about all this—it’s definitely not easy, suddenly transforming into something else.”

“How do you know?”

“Well, I was a cat once”, Omi said, casually. “I know this is kinda different but the point stands.”

Raimundo was in awe. “So you’re a _cat_…but then you became human?”

“No, I’m a human”, Omi explained. “But this thing happened and I became a cat for a while and then I turned back into a human.”

“Wow”, Raimundo said, impressed. “That’s one impressive trick.”

Not wanting to explain this again, the now-older boy nodded. He peered into one of the shelves, looking for the scroll he came here to find, but found nothing. Looking back to the table by his shrunken friend, Omi saw about seven spread out scrolls.

“Raimundo?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have the scrolls about Xiaolin history?”, Omi began. “One of the elders needs it; the new apprentices have a lesson now.”

Raimundo handed him one of the scrolls and Omi felt something weird was going on. No witty quips, no smirks, no attitude. Nothing at all.

“Hey, is there something bothering you?”

“Bothering me? No, I don’t think so”, Raimundo said, shrugging. Seeming torn about something, he made up his mind. “Thank you.”

Raising an eyebrow, Omi almost began to speak before being interrupted by the little boy, who seemed at once embarrassed but adamant on speaking his mind.

“Everyone’s been treating me like I’m stupid”, Raimundo said. “Because I’m a little younger today but, but I’m not stupid and you’re the only one who didn’t treat me like I was.”

A pause. “But if you tell anyone I—”

“I’m not gonna tell anyone you said this, don’t worry”, Omi said, smiling now. Well, if this ironically wasn’t a sentiment he knew all too well. “I’ve actually been where are you are now. Always overlooked and being treated with kid-gloves because I’m—I _was_ the youngest here.”

Taking a second to breathe, he added. “But I made sure they’d never overlook me again, so trust me, it will all work out.”

Nodding at his now-older teammate, Raimundo smiled before getting up and following him out the scroll room.

“So, you guys must have a game console around here, right?”

* * *

The next day—well, twelve hours later—when Wuya showed up to pick up Raimundo for her teaching trip, Kimiko and Clay were more than happy to send him on his merry way. Even Omi had to admit he’d breathed a sigh of relief at the tension leaving their temple for now.

Still, that couldn’t mean he wasn’t worried. “How do you think it will go with Wuya?”

“Who knows?”, Kimiko said with a shrug. “I just don’t want the brat to become Heylin. That will just be a nightmare.”

Clay huffed. “Tell me about it. I don’t know about y’all but I miss Regular Rai.”

As the Dragons reminisced about the good old days that were quite literally the day before yesterday, Wuya was pacing back and forth in the part of Chase Young’s citadel she’d taken for her own.

Watching her pace was an impatient seven year-old in a t-shirt and jeans sitting on a rock.

“So, Raimundo”, Wuya began, after a minute. “What exactly do you remember?”

“You mean, before the accident?”

“Yes, before the incident. Do you remember anything? Good? Bad?”

“I don’t know”, Raimundo said, scrunching his face. “I remember little things, like I’ve been to that temple before and I know that bald old man and the gecko. I remember I _really_ love flying but I don’t know why.”

A pause. “I’ve only been on a plane one. Last _Natal_, we went to my Tio Gabriel’s house in Medellín and it was _amazing_, they have a real—”

“That’s all nice, Raimundo, very nice”, Wuya began, barely holding back her yelling. “But let’s get started with our lesson, okay?”

The boy nodded. “Sure. And then we can get me all the things you said I could get?”

“And then I’ll get you so many things you won’t be able to imagine how much you can have.”

Motioning him nearer, Wuya cleared her throat and began giving her instructions. Stand like this, _no_, don’t tense up like that. You’ll lose a leg _and_ _an_ _eyebrow_ if you don’t concentrate and you _need_ to concentrate.

“Now what?”, the kid asked, after perfecting the stance she asked for.

Wuya approved, nodding. “Now we start teaching you some magic. So, you need to be in tune with all the elements that make up this physical world and—”

“All of them?”

“…Yes, all of them. Now—”

“But at the temple they said everyone gets one element and mine is wind.”

“I know that”, Wuya said, smiling a big painful smile. “But what we’re doing here is ignoring all of that so we can achieve a state of—”

“But they also said that one person having too many elements is actually bad. Like it’s bad for balance or something?”

“It is. That’s the point. Balance is for losers, okay? Now, you need to concentrate because we’ll be dealing with a lot of elements and you may get hurt. So—”

“I’m hungry”, Raimundo announced, dropping his stance. “Can we get McDonald’s? There’s a McDonald’s here, right?”

Wuya barely kept the vein in her head from popping. “Yes but we won’t go until we finish these first forms.”

“But I’m hungry now and I won’t concentrate if I don’t eat.”

“Well, you will have to do that if you want your junk food! Fix your stance, Raimundo.”

Instead of doing exactly what she asked, Raimundo crossed his arms and sat on the ground, choosing to remain unmoving and not go anywhere or do anything, pouting deeply.

“Oh, what now?”, Wuya said, sighing exasperatedly.

When the kid said nothing, the Heylin witch put her hands on her hips and glared directly at him in the eye. That didn’t faze him. Instead, de-aged Raimundo glared right back, keeping his arms crossed.

Almost blanching at the insolence and wishing she just had a quarter of her powers, Wuya couldn’t believe this is what it had come down to. She’d been planning to get the boy on her side and teach him enough spells to use him in getting the Wu she needed to get her own powers back.

Unfortunately for her, she hadn’t thought out this plan through because Raimundo was being difficult and she had zero experience dealing with children. The last ‘child’ she’d ever seen was Jack Spicer’s little cousin when she was ten and as haunting as that was, she was not prepared for this.

And, embarrassingly enough, she didn’t know how to get out of it.

Stomping away, Wuya grabbed the phone the warriors had given the boy for emergencies off the rock he’d been sitting on and dialed the first number she saw.

“Meet me at the McDonald’s”, Wuya said, whispering so the kid wouldn’t hear and gloat. “Now.”

Half an hour later, Wuya and de-aged Raimundo were at the nearby town’s McDonald’s, ordering a meal for the ungrateful child.

No one was happy at this development, not the disgruntled witch who’d just lost a chance at getting her powers back or the cashier who was peeved at them holding up the line.

“I’m here, I’m here”, Kimiko said, walking into the place and rushing to the front of the line. “Use my card. Here you go.”

Relieved, the cashier finally finished up at the transaction and sent the trio on their merry way with their meal, already prepared because no one on the staff wanted the hassle.

As they sat so Raimundo could eat, Wuya directed her glare to the other Xiaolin warrior.

“Take. Him.”

“Why?”, Kimiko asked, grinning. “Not as easy as it looks, huh?”

Wuya scowled. “I have dealt with a lot in my life—”

“Well, if that’s not an understatement for a century and a half!”

“But I will _not_ deal with this”, the witch finished, frown deepening. “There’s a reason I rarely took apprentices and I re-discovered it, so take your little Xiaolin runt and go.”

“I would love to”, Kimiko said, hand on her heart. “I really would but here’s the thing—we said we both would get one full day and yours isn’t really over it. It’s by our honor as Dragons that you take—”

“Spare me the ‘honor’ bullshit”, Wuya said, waving it off. “What do you want?”

The girl smiled. “Help me get him back to normal _or_ _else_.”

“Or else what?”

“You get full custody!”

After a minimal stare-down that last all of sixty seconds, Wuya got up and motioned the kid and the warrior to follow her.

“I know a shortcut to Jack’s house from here”, she said, reluctantly. “Follow me.”

The shortcut to Jack’s house proved as effective as Wuya promised it would be, but still that wouldn’t mean anything if Kimiko was walking into a trap rather than a solution.

Checking for her hidden Wu in her pocket, Kimiko made sure she kept her de-aged teammate within her sight at all times as they both followed the Heylin witch into the house and up the stairs.

“He’s always holed up in his room”, Wuya said, as she climbed up the stairs. “It makes it especially easy to find him.”

And find him, they did. After they barged in, quite literally breaking the door, Kimiko, Wuya, and Raimundo found Jack laying on his bed, watching a movie on his laptop.

“Um”, Jack began, quickly pausing the movie. “What the fuck?”

Raimundo nodded, sympathetically. “I know.”

“Shut up”, Wuya said, finally dropping her nice aunt act. “You, change him back. _Now_.”

Getting off his bed, Jack took another look at his visitors before shrugging and shaking his head.

“What is that supposed to mean?”, Kimiko asked, annoyed. “We didn’t come here to waste time!”

Jack snorted. “Then don’t. Look, I don’t know why this weird partnership is happening but I’m not helping you at all. What would I gain from helping one of my nemeses and my evil ex-mentor? _Nothing_.”

He paused, chuckling. “Besides, I don’t see what the big deal is. At least now you get to raise him to have manners!”

Rolling his eyes at that, Raimundo looked up at Kimiko, who was seething and breathing out extra-warm air. Wuya noticed this too and nudged the girl to calm her down.

“Don’t bother, Kimiko”, Wuya said, giving her a look. “After all, it’s not a big deal. We’ve only been dealing with this transformation for two days.”

The girl nodded, understanding what the witch meant. “Exactly. Hey, Jack?”

“What do you want?”

“Let’s make a deal”, she began. “We’ll leave Raimundo here with you for an hour, okay? And if it’s still ‘not that big of a deal’ when it’s over, we’ll leave.”

“Yeah”, Jack began, scratching his chin. “What’s in it for me?”

Kimiko shrugged. “If you still don't want to change him, I will give you the Star Hanabi.”

“Eh, deal. It’s like taking candy from a baby.”

A pause. “...So, where will you go?”

Not bothering with an answer, Wuya walked out of the room first and was quickly followed by Kimiko, who threw a quick ‘none of your business’ over her shoulder before she left.

After making their way down to the kitchen, Wuya greeted the terrified maid and told her to make them some tea. As the maid got to work, Kimiko glanced at the tea cabinet and whistled.

“You’re right”, she said. “They have a lot of teas here. I don’t think we have some of this at the temple; Master Fung will be devastated.”

Wuya scoffed. “He’ll get over it.”

A pause. “You know, you could do great things if you were evil. That little dragon-breath trick could be useful if you’re using it on the right side.”

“I _am_ using it on the right side, though”, Kimiko said, raising an eyebrow. “But, thank you. Likewise!”

As time slowly trickled past, the warrior and the witch passed their time by scrolling through the internet and reading a spare home décor magazine, respectively. Occasionally, one would throw a rogue comment in the air to break the silence but a full conversation never really prospered.

That is, of course, until Jack came marching in and broke all forms of silence, exactly one hour later. Fuming and dragging the de-aged boy by the hand, Jack pointed at both people sitting at the table.

“This kid”, Jack began, looking he wanted to use stronger words. Meanwhile, Raimundo smiled innocently. “This kid is a human migraine in a skinsuit!”

“Oh, are you mad, Ginger Spice?”, Raimundo said, pretending to care. “You’re the one who wouldn’t make the game multi-player!”

At this predicable development and the ensuing exchange, Kimiko and Wuya shared a triumphant look before Jack turned to face them again.

“Make him stand still so I can turn him back”, Jack said. “And please, _please_ forget my address.”


	18. First, First Impressions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No joke, this really happened.

Though it may not look nor feel like it now, with all the memories they shared, there had been a time when the Dragons were strangers. Total perfect strangers, at that.

There was a time when they had their own lives in a Texas small town just outside of Houston (Clay), the hustle and bustle of Tokyo's daily life (Kimiko), and, well, everywhere and anywhere around the globe that a Brazilian circus could visit (Raimundo).

But that would all change after extensive visits and explanations from Master Fung and Dojo, of course. And now, that change was about to be felt here, at the Zhengzhou Xinzheng International Airport.

At twelve-going-on-thirteen in April, Tohomiko Kimiko had already been to quite a lot of airports so one more wouldn’t have been news. Except that, right now, it _was_.

Her father’s line of work demanded it, so she wasn’t a stranger to impromptu trips for conferences and meetings and launchings and fan conventions in places like Baku, London, Bangkok, Rome, Accra, and many more.

To her, changing jets was like changing outfits and her passport was running out of pages for her visa stamps. And now, this would all change.

She was at her final stop, apparently. An airport in Henan, which she would leave in a couple of hours for the Xiaolin temple. See, apparently she had fire powers and was destined to save the world and whatnot. Keiko had been pretty jealous when she heard that.

_Keiko_, Kimiko thought now, realizing how awful her homesickness would be. Was she going to make friends easily at that temple?

Well, would she even vibe well with the others there? How often would Keiko be able to visit and how soon was _too soon_ to ask Master Fung to let her come over?

In the middle of all those questions, Kimiko almost didn’t notice the figure drawing nearer and nearer, peering into her face. A dark-skinned boy, around her age, who was giving her all sorts of judgmental looks.

“Excuse me”, she said, in English, judging the boy to be just some curious tourist. “Is there a problem?”

He didn’t stop staring. In fact, he made it worse by talking. “_Duh_. Have you _seen_ a mirror, girl?”

“_Wow_, I don’t know what your problem is but if you don’t—”

“I’m not trying to be an asshole, I swear”, the boy said, though she heavily questioned that. Something about him just screamed dickhead energy. “Your wig is sliding.”

Those four words were enough to scandalize Kimiko far more than the staring did. Instantly, she took a compact mirror out of her backpack’s front flap and surveyed the damage.

“_Kuso_”, she cursed, almost inaudibly. The rude boy was right. Her blonde wig, carefully brushed and placed, had slipped back to show just enough of her wig-cap to be tacky.

Shielding her edges and forehead with her hands, Kimiko shot the boy a glare, as if blaming all her current problems on him. A pattern that would make itself known far more often in the future.

“Thank _you_ for this.”

“How is this _my_ problem? I was just giving you a heads up.”

“I don’t care, I’m blaming you”, Kimiko snarled. “If you didn’t tell me, I wouldn’t have noticed!”

The boy snorted. “Yeah, okay. You know what? I _was_ going to help you out but now—”

“Oh, you _are_ helping me”, she said, stopping him then and there. “I’m not walking around _like_ _this_.”

She paused, carefully exhaling her anger. Now, she had to be nice. “I’m Kimiko, by the way.”

“Raimundo”, the boy said, rolling his eyes soon after that. “So, you’ve probably never heard of wig glue.”

“No, I did”, she said, tone sharper than she intended. Sighing, she shook her head and gave him an apologetic yet fed-up look. “It’s just…I never thought I’d need it. My wigs stayed on perfectly before.”

“I mean”, Raimundo began with a shrug before sitting at one of the metal chairs in the general waiting areas. He propped his own backpack on his lap and zipped it open to look for the glue. “You probably don’t stay wearing them for the whole day, right?”

“Usually, like an hour or two”, Kimiko agreed. “Or six, maximum.”

Pausing, she took a breath. She didn’t know why she felt the need to elaborate but she was going for it anyway.

“Today, I wore it like super early”, she added. “I had to. I had a lot of people to go say goodbye to and I wanted to look nice, you know?”

“And then you got on the plane and that did the rest of the damage”, he predicted, still digging around for the glue. “Long flight?”

“You could say that”, Kimiko said. “It’s only eight hours from Tokyo to here but I’ve been on longer flights.”

A pause. “And you, where did you come from?”

“Rio.”

“Wait, Rio as in _Brazil_ Rio?”

“As far as I know, we haven’t declared independence yet”, Raimundo said, raising an eyebrow. “Why are you so surprised?”

Kimiko made a face. “That must have been a long flight!”

“Well, I did spend two days in the air”, he said, seemingly bragging and agreeing with her in the same sentence. “We stopped at London, though. Not my favorite city, but eh.”

“I’ve been to London”, Kimiko said. “It’s good-ish, I’d say.”

Making a noncommittal sound at her comment, he finally found what he was looking for. A small eye-drop-lookalike container with words Kimiko couldn’t really read.

“You found it”, she redundantly mentioned, unable to help her tone. She knew what he’d been looking for but she was still surprised. “Hey, why do _you_ have wig glue?”

Raimundo gestured vaguely as he uncapped the bottle. “It’s the kinda thing you just have when you do what I do. Well, what I _used_ to do.”

“Oh, you have—_had_ a job?”, Kimiko asked, not seeing this one coming. He looked too young for that. “Doing what?”

“I was with the circus and my job was…a lot of things”, he said, pushing her wig even further and applying the glue around her edges. “But I was, like, mostly an acrobat, you know. Doing all the _cool_ stuff.”

Though she easily caught his lie about all the ‘cool stuff’, Kimiko let it slide. Usually, she would have kept clawing at half-truths and white lies like these until the people saying them relented.

But then again, she was probably never seeing this guy again. “Nice. So, why did you leave?”

“I got this, uh, school offer here so I just decided to check it out.”

“Sounds nice”, Kimiko said, genuinely. “I’m not a tourist either. I’m—”

Cutting herself short, she suddenly realized she hasn’t talked to Master Fung about this.

Was this a ‘secret identity’ type of thing or could she tell just about anyone what she was doing in China. She did tell Keiko, _obviously_, but this boy was essentially a stranger.

“You’re what?”, Raimundo prompted, tugging the wig into place again and smoothing down the edges.

Noting that he didn’t seem all that curious anyway, Kimiko shrugged. “I’m checking out academies here. My father is considering boarding school and—uh, _what_ are you doing?”

“Sorry”, the boy said, a little embarrassedly. After he’d set the wig, Raimundo did the most logical and natural thing in the world. He blew on the recently-set parts.

Coughing to clear the awkwardness, he added, “It’s just, you’re supposed to wait until it dries and—_never mind_, you got it from here. Just tie a scarf around it or something and wait for a few.”

Getting up, Raimundo wore his backpack again and started dragging his suitcase away before he stopped and gave her a particularly sympathetic onceover.

“Oh and by the way, if you have a mirror, you should, you know, _use_ it. You look like you have wardrobe malfunctions on the regular.”

Though he’d rolled away in record timing and probably didn’t hear her, Kimiko very loudly scoffed.

“Well, fuck you too, pal! And by the way, I didn’t need your pity—I had it _just_ _fine_.”

Crossing her arms and leaning back into her seat, surrounded by her four suitcases, Kimiko waited for a moment before muttering to herself in Japanese and taking her phone out.

“Wait till Keiko hears about this!”

* * *

Clay Bailey was kinda lost. No, scratch that. He was _definitely_ lost. And while his parents wouldn’t find this nearly as amusing as all the other comedies about lost kids wreaking havoc, Clay supposed they didn’t have a thing to worry about.

See, he was just a little lost in translation. Maybe also a little lost in life, too. And at fourteen, well, that was a pretty big statement to make.

He was living just fine in his Texas small town and he knew all he had to do and all that was expected to do as well. In the morning, there was school and in the afternoon, there was Tai-chi. If he had time, he’d cross out his house and ranch chores, but he mostly left that for weekends.

_Well_, Clay thought as he huffed to himself and pushed his baggage cart forward. There was no school and no ranch and no chores now, though a hunch did tell him he was wrong about that last one.

_Ah, well_, the cowboy thought, _the price to pay for being way too in tune with the earth_. He’d never really thought a few rumbles he felt all too deeply within the ranch would ever lead to his meeting Master Fung, but that’s just the way it went.

And then the way it went led him to apply for a visa and then booking an airline ticket and then roaming around a Henan airport a long way from home.

By all means, Clay was sure living his Karate Kid circa Jaden Smith dream. Including all the bits where he was lost in translation.

After a full day’s worth of traveling, Clay was really in the mood for a smoothie and while many stands had menus translated to English, he was really into the image-options at this particular English-less menu stand.

Sighing, Clay supposed he could just do the normal thing and tell the cashier he wanted ‘_that one’_ but that just sounded so childish and unworldly and that was not the image he planned to have in the first day of his new life in China.

So, that left the white boy with only one option didn’t it? He’d just have to ask someone to translate the menu for him and pray he didn’t look like an ignorant American.

At about the same time Clay reached that conclusion, though, so did one girl with a big blue scarf tied comically around her head sitting on the metal benches in front of the stand. 

Though she did look about his age and was too short to be intimidating, that glare and exasperated sigh made Clay feel instantly apologetic for things he hadn’t done yet. A pattern he didn’t yet know would be repeated in the future.

“I’m sorry, Miss”, Clay said, when she stood up and was now effectively next to him with no way to avoid. “Can you help me out here?”

The girl with the blue scarf gave him a look. “Yeah, you look like you need help. Come on, what is it?”

“…I wanted to order a smoothie.”

“That’s it?”, the girl said, incredulously. “That’s what you’ve been spinning around like a headless chicken about?”

Though the mention the chicken did make Clay think of the ranch, he shoved away the homesickness for now. “Well, yeah, little lady, I’m kinda thirsty.”

“So drink water.”

“But I want a smoothie”, Clay began before shaking his head. He didn’t know why but from her tone, it sounded like he was about to be part of an argument he didn’t want. “Never mind. Thanks anyway, Miss.”

But before he could turn and look for someone else to help, the girl grabbed him by the sleeve. “Wait, I’m sorry. I’m a little cranky—long flight and all. What do you want to order?”

“Thank you”, the cowboy said, genuinely. “I want a strawberry smoothie.”

A pause. “And, okay, I’ve been flying out for almost two days and the airplane food tastes exactly like my Aunt Marybeth’s cooking, so I wouldn’t mind a muffin and some chips too.”

“Good call”, the girl said, allowing a smile to cross her face. She extended her hand. “I’m Kimiko.”

“Clay”, he introduced himself, tipping his hat. “I’ve got some Chinese cash here—my Daddy thought I’d probably need something from the airport.”

Nodding at him once, Kimiko flicked the two ends of her scarf over her shoulders and made her to the cashier, looking at once ridiculous and as effortlessly stylish as one person could get.

Standing next to her, Clay actually felt like the lost in translation idiot he was. Here was this girl, talking rapidly and confidently in the language he’d never studied of the place he’d known he was going to for a long time.

After giving the cashier his cash and adding some of her own for a snack, Kimiko took the change and the snacks. She turned to Clay to hand him his change and food and stuffed her own change into her front pockets.

Kimiko took a bite of her croissant. “So where from? Tennessee? Georgia? Uh, Florida…I guess?”

“Florida’s _not_ southern”, Clay said, trying not to sound too offended though he deeply, incomprehensibly was. Seriously, _Florida_? “And I’m from the Lone Star state. Texan and proud!”

Though she didn’t say ‘_perhaps too proud’_, that amused smirk probably meant it all the same. Hands on her hips, Kimiko gave him a look.

“Florida’s _literally_ in the south, though. I should know I’ve seen American maps a bunch of times.”

“I wouldn’t claim it, personally”, he said, brushing over the subject. “So, California?”

“No, why would you think that?”

“No specific reason. You just sound like my cousin Hanna, is all. That one’s a Cali girl, through and through.”

Kimiko shrugged. “I’m from Tokyo, actually. And ironically, I’ve never been to California. Like, unless you count Silicon Valley, which I _do_ _not_.”

Noticing the confused stare, she explained, “My father’s a businessman. We travel a lot.”

“Sounds like you’re mighty worldly”, Clay said, impressed and a little envious. “Dunno if you can tell but this is actually my very first time flying…_anywhere_.”

“Not even domestically?”

“Nah—all my relatives come to us for reunions. But I did go to New York once by train—”

“Oh, New York! That sounds—”

“I hated it”, Clay finished his sentence, smiling a little sheepishly. “I’m not big on cities. Everyone there pretends to be all that and a bucket of fries when they don’t know a bit from a butt.”

A pause. “Ya can say I fell off the watermelon truck all ya want—you know it’s true!”

“Oh no, I won’t say…_that_”, Kimiko said with a pleasant tone and condescending eyes. Once again, Clay felt the need to disappear but couldn’t. “Who knows? Maybe Zhengzhou is going to be the city that changes your mind.”

Clay shrugged. “Nah, I won’t be seeing much of the city. I’m heading to Dengfeng, actually, and I’ve read online it’s a little rural.”

“That’s weird, I’m going to Dengfeng too. I didn’t know there was that much to sightsee there.”

“Well, I won’t be doing that”, he said, drawing the sentence out. He wanted to say more.

He didn’t see why he couldn’t say anything since Master Fung hasn’t said a thing about how secret this would be. Still, Clay knew he should probably keep it low-key. He read enough Spiderman comics to know that.

Clay nodded, settling his self-debate. “I’m going to visit a temple, though. In a way, it might be sightseeing.”

Although clearly intrigued, Kimiko didn’t prod much. “Okay then. Maybe we’ll run into each other, Clay.”

“Yeah, that’d be nice”, Clay said, though he didn’t mean it. Something about that girl’s attitude rubbed him the wrong way. Despite the friendliness, he could tell she was almost too spoiled salt wouldn’t save her. “I’ll see ya when I see ya then!”

Turning his baggage cart around, Clay sighed and tried to find his bearings again.

Faintly, he had half a mind to call Jessie and Patrick to tell them all about the citified girl with the blue scarf who thought she was too good for country boots.

But doing that only made Clay remember how he left things with his siblings. _Oh well_.

* * *

In his short, rather eventful twelve-almost-thirteen years, Raimundo Araújo Pedrosa had been to approximately twenty-eight countries. Sure, this seemed a lot but to himself, he was simply a traveler at heart.

That and the fact that he’d been a part of a traveling circus kind of made it hard not to travel.

Sadly, though, it seemed like Raimundo’s traveling days were behind him. See, he was leaving the circus to become a monk.

Yes, _really_. But he wasn’t about to become his family’s next cautionary tale for nothing.

That Master Fung dude had said that he’d apparently caught a spirit (_no, not Jesus_) and was kinda destined to save the world and protect it from evil. Oh, and his powers were wind-based.

Sweet deal, Raimundo knew. And sweeter was knowing that he would finally go on to be his own person. Without six older siblings whose shadows he’d have to live under, without an uptight ringleader to throw casual microaggressions around. Just him.

The one problem so far? Well, this ‘just him’ thing meant he had little to no money, only one suitcase, and his sole prized possession was football boots signed by _O Fenômeno_ right before he retired.

_Time for another re-check_, Raimundo thought, dragging his suitcase to another metal-bench in the endless airport. He was sure he packed those shoes, but because of how precious they were, he couldn’t help but check on them every twenty minutes.

Opening his rather large backpack, Raimundo ignored the looks he was getting from curious passersby and rummaged a little for his shoes. After a full minute of rummaging, though, his eyes were wide-open in shock and fear. Where were they?

“_Porra_, where the fuck did they go”, he muttered to himself in Portuguese. “No, no, no, _no_.”

Though he really didn’t need it to, Raimundo’s mind went to the worst case scenario, which was someone likely pickpocketed him.

No, wait. They did have that layover in London. Did he forget them there? And—_no_, what about that time where he wanted some water and couldn’t find his wallet and basically emptied his backpack to find it?

“I’m fucked”, Raimundo said, now in English. Something just told him he had to switch languages then and there. And never once did he thought that would be the start of a lifelong friendship.

Appearing out of nowhere in his vision, a white boy all dressed up as cowboy, boots and everything, dragged a baggage cart nearer to the distressed boy with the open backpack.

White boy looked concerned. “I hope you don’t mind me sayin’ but you look like you’re one wheel down with the axel dragging. Need any help?”

“Uh, I don’t”, Raimundo began, unsure of how to navigate this.

He was a little unsure of whether this was a prank show setup or not. Those white youtubers went _anywhere_ these days. But then again, he did need help and he’d take it from anyone willing to give it, really.

“Yeah, sure I need help”, he backtracked, waving it off like it didn’t matter. “I was robbed.”

The cowboy squinted. “Really? There’s security everywhere. Whatever it is, are ya sure you didn’t just lose it?”

“That’s a possibility. But it’s something really, really valuable so I wouldn’t put it past stealing. _Fuck_.”

A pause. “I’m gonna go insane now.”

“Whoa, don’t get ahead of yourself, partner”, the white boy said, gesturing him to calm down. “How about we head off to the lost and found? Maybe someone found your thingamajig and left it there.”

Raimundo was not convinced. Sighing, the cowboy picked up on that. “And if it’s stolen, maybe we can ask them to make an announcement.”

“Yeah, cool, whatever gets the job done”, Raimundo said, playing nonchalant even though he was running a hundred laps per second on the inside. “Let’s go….uh, what’s your name, Billy Bob?”

“Clay”, the white boy said, extending a hand. “Pleasure to meet ya.”

The other boy shook the extended hand. “Raimundo. And we’ll see about that.”

Turning his baggage cart in the opposite direction, Clay cleared his throat. “Uh, so you’re here for a short trip, I see.”

“What? No”, Raimundo said, before his eyes darted back to his one suitcase. _Yeah_, that made sense. “I’m actually moving here. Just didn’t see the need to take everything I have when I could buy new.”

“That’s cool”, the cowboy said, before hurriedly adding as he remembered his three suitcases, “I, uh, I just have a lot of things I wanted to have with me. And I’ll be staying here a long time.”

Raimundo shrugged. “Hey, it’s not my problem, no judgment.”

Naturally, this was a lie but neither boy knew they’d be fighting over space in their joint room later that day. So, Clay nodded and moseyed on along.

As they turned again and took the left to the escalators, though, Raimundo just had to ask.

“Texas?”

“Born and raised”, Clay said, pleasantly surprised. “How’d ya know?”

Raimundo scoffed. “Your walk. You look like you just got off a horse.”

“City boy”, the cowboy scoffed.

“I sure am”, the other boy said, sounding every much as prideful as Clay was about Texas. “And, surprise, surprise—Texas has cities, too. I should know, I’ve _been_ to Houston. You’re just a bitter townie.”

A pause. “Also, I’ve ridden horses too. Big deal.”

“Well, I’ll be”, Clay said, not knowing what to make of this but smiling all the same. He knew he was being insulted, somehow, and yet he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. “Rodeos and stuff?”

Raimundo shrugged. “Nah, circuses and stuff.”

“…You’re a _carnie_?”

“Oh, fuck you—there’s a _huge_ difference. How _dare_ you?”

“I’m sorry, partner. Didn’t know that’d offend you”, Clay said, sincerely. Well, you learned something every day, didn’t you?

Raimundo sighed and gave the other boy a look. “I’ll forgive you just this once because I’m already having the weirdest day—like two hours ago, I had to help this girl with her wig.”

“I know what you mean”, Clay said, though he didn’t know he’d be meaning it literally. “I met this one girl with an attitude the size of hell and half of Texas. One weird scarf too!”

As they walked and shared laughs while ranting at the girl who would eventually be their teammate, Raimundo and Clay finally reached the lost and found.

“Hi”, Raimundo started, pleasantly enough. “We’d like to report a crime.”

When the employee behind the glass looked puzzled, Clay intervened. A pattern neither knew would be repeated in the future. “He’s lost a prized possession, ma’am.”

“Well”, the lady behind the glass asked. “What is it?”

“2011 Nike Mercurial Vapor Superfly”, Raimundo said, reciting from memory. “Football boots signed by one of the greatest footballers of all time ever, ma’am.”

The lady looked perplexed. “We don’t have any shoes, though.”

At that, Clay and Raimundo shared a look before turning to the lady to explain in overlapping voices. Yet another soon to be repeated pattern. Five seconds later, they finally got their point across to the employee and the small mic was slid across the table.

“Whoever has my boots”, Raimundo said, after extensively describing the shoes. “Please bring them to the lost and found. Or else, your mom’s a hoe.”

_Unideal_, Raimundo thought after handing the mic back, but hey, he’d always wanted to do that.

* * *

Two hours after all the would-be-Dragons roaming around Zhengzhou Xinzheng International Airport individually met each other, they all finally received calls that their rides were there to pick them up.

Naturally, the three teenagers, all different corners of the airport, rushed to the main gate and waited outside with their luggage.

At first, Raimundo nodded at Clay who nodded back after pretending not to recognize the other boy at first. Then, Kimiko looked up from her phone and spotted the interaction and squinted, knowing that she knew both boys. But she didn’t say anything.

At least, until one future Wind Dragon started. “Oh my _God_. Girl, you _still_ have that scarf on? Your wig is okay; take it off!”

“Well”, Kimiko grumbled, untying the gigantic blue scarf and feeling some of the missing blood rush back to her head. “You didn’t say _how_ _long_ I had to tie it!”

Taking a doubletake at the now undone scarf, Clay shared a look with Raimundo. “Scarf Girl is…”

“Wig Girl”, the other boy finished, looking just as amazed as the cowboy at the mutual discovery. “I _know_. Talk about coincidences, right?”

Scoffing, though mostly to herself, Kimiko knew there had to be more to it. In hindsight, it was so obvious. And while she really didn’t want to bring it up, well, who would?

“I can hear you and I think you two can tell I don’t have the best temper”, she said.

Turning her back to the street to face both boys, Kimiko curiously began. “_You_ said you got a school offer here and _you_ said you were coming to visit a temple.”

“And _he_ said he was moving here”, Clay added, feeling like he was adding a piece to a puzzle he was starting to see. “And _you_ said you’re going to Dengfeng like I was.”

Gesturing in an ‘I guess’ manner after the two turned their sights on him, Raimundo finished.

“Well, Kimiko said she was going to boarding school here and Clay said he was staying here a long time so...”

After other shared looks and exasperation, the three teenagers started at the same time. “_Master Fung_.”

And Master Fung, they confirmed it was as they chatted and filled in the rest of the puzzle pieces before their one shared cab finally came to pick them up.

And later that day, well…

“They’re not what I expected”, a short brown-skinned Chinese boy, about ten or so, was saying way too judgmentally.

Master Fung nodded at them in lieu of greeting and gave Omi a look. “The best things in life rarely are.”


	19. Jack Spicer Gets A Job

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once in a blue moon, I feel like a Jack-story

Life is full of little ironies and they usually hit us when we least expect it. At least that’s what Jack _tried_ to tell himself that day.

He still wasn’t a hundred percent sure he wasn’t hallucinating. You see, _Jack Spicer_ was getting a _job_. At an ice-cream parlor, no less.

“And you have to clean the milkshake machine at the end of every shift”, Jack’s new boss was telling him, as she gave him the tour. “And that’s everything. So, do you get it?”

A little too dismayed to smile, Jack nodded. “Got, Ms. Cho. I’ll get to work now.”

“Oh yes”, Ms. Cho said, cheerily. “You go on and get acquainted with everything and I’ll get going too. Pilates can’t wait!”

As he watched the old Chinese woman walk out of the shop, all bright smiles and readiness to take on the day, Jack dropped his own fake smile and stretched.

Today was going to be a long day, he could tell. _Maybe,_ Jack thought, he shouldn’t have been as mean to the maids that served at his house after all. The karma was surely going to bite him back any minute now.

Karma waited for Jack throughout the day. The beginning of the shift wasn’t that bad because it was still very early for ice-cream so no one came in.

Things got a lot tougher when the skipping schoolkids started trickling in, though. They wanted a lot of things and it was a hassle because Jack didn’t know all the flavors yet.

By the time schools were out and some jobs were, Jack was pretty much experienced and pissed off. He knew what a person would want and tried to prepare it as fast as he could, which wasn’t fast enough, so sometimes a lot of yelling was directed in his general direction.

Sighing after a particularly hectic custom interaction, Jack crossed his arms and leaned against the milkshake machine. Right now, all he wanted was that no one approach him for anything whatsoever and so far the customers were doing just that.

Naturally, that all had to change.

“—and he was, like, oh I’m _fragile_, I can’t handle criticism!”, a familiar high-pitched, slightly squeaky voice yelled as the ringing bells signaled new customers. “He didn’t say that _literally_, but like, I’m paraphrasing.”

Now, Jack wasn’t an easily scared guy. He’d been deep in a middle of an eternal conflict between two powerful magical forces, he’d met the evilest evil could offer, and he’d kinda stared death in the face on more than one occasion.

Still, _nothing_ scared that boy more than that appealing high-pitched voice. See, its owner sort of almost broke his arm just a few days back and it still hasn’t fully recovered.

Lowering the baseball cap that came with the uniform down as much as he could, Jack hoped and prayed that it wasn’t the Xiaolin Dragons who had just walked in.

Sadly, he was quickly proven wrong. Dorky robes or not, Jack could recognize them anywhere.

Currently, they looked like some ridiculous teen-drama friend group as they walked to far-off booth.

Kimiko, with an impressively long braid that was definitely seventy-five percent extensions, was still talking as they sat down. Omi, normally dressed for once, didn’t seem impressed with what was being said, but Clay had a small smile and Raimundo was chuckling a little.

Seeing this scene, Jack realized something. He _really_ didn’t want to serve that booth.

Jack looked around the shop and saw that there weren’t any customers waiting to be served. There was no one coming in too, which was a blessing turned into a curse as of now.

It was about to get worse too. Omi had gotten up and was making his way to the counter, oblivious to the panicking Jack.

The evil teen genius turned around, giving the upcoming customer his back, and tried to find anything to busy himself with. Maybe now was a good time to clean the milkshake machine. Who knew?

“Excuse me, sir”, Omi said, trying to get Jack’s attention. “Can I get a little help here?”

In response, Jack only made a vague gesture indicating that he was busy and would get to Omi in a minute.

“Oh okay”, the young warrior said. “Thank you, sir.”

Hearing the shuffling away, Jack breathed a sigh of relief and took his phone out to read the time. His shift would not be over until three more hours when another employee would get to the shop.

“_Fuck me_”, Jack muttered to himself. “There’s no way out. Those goddamn Xiaolin losers always have to—”

“Have to what?”, a familiar voice Jack dreaded hearing said. “I didn’t quite catch that.”

Jack sighed and turned around. “_Do_ _not_.”

“Uh? _Fuck_ _yeah_”, Raimundo said, smiling gleefully. “I very much will do everything you don’t want me to do.”

Opting to say nothing just yet, Jack glared the best way he knew how, but Raimundo didn’t seem to get the message.

“Oh no, _please_”, the Dragon said, deadpanned. “I’m getting chills.”

Jack scoffed. “What do you want, asshole?”

“See, that really hurt my feelings, Jack”, Raimundo said. “I’m so hurt I may just have to take a feedback form and report this.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Have you _met_ me? I would do far worse, don’t tempt my pettiness.”

After another stare-down, Jack caved in. “_Fine_. Do you want anything?”

“Yeah”, Raimundo said. “Two chocolate sundaes, one mint chocolate chip, and one caramel and we need the last two dairy-free.”

He paused. “And don’t pull any shit with the dairy-free thing. Kimiko and Omi are lactose intolerant.”

“Noted”, Jack said, glaring. “Anything else?”

“Yeah”, the other boy said. “You’re Kardashian rich, why are you working here?”

Jack nodded. “Actually, we’re much richer and it’s not any of your business. Next.”

Raising his hands in a defeated manner, Raimundo smiled and moved along. The way he looked back, though, was mischievous and definitely up to something.

As he set to work, Jack had two thoughts. He really needed to know if Raimundo kinda is eviler than he was and really needed to clean that milkshake machine

One hour later, Jack was now actively considering to quit his not-yet-one-day job. Then again, the Dragons had that effect on anyone.

During the minimal time they’d spent in the ice-cream shop, they had managed to order a bunch of things, realized they made a collective ‘mistake’, and had Jack fix the orders. Then there was all the loud yelling, of course.

“They’ll get bored”, Jack repeated to himself for the fourth time. “They’ll get bored, they have to.”

That seemed to be taking a long time coming, though. Sighing, Jack rolled his eyes at Omi’s raised hand and headed to the dreaded table. Again.

“—I do not care how many chores you’ll do for me, bro”, Raimundo was saying, emphasizing every word. “Nothing on this good earth will make me go on a date with that low-grade Becky you call a cousin.”

“O-kay”, Clay began. “First of all, that’s rude. And secondly, I’m just asking you to take her to the debutante’s ball. Also, her name is Molly-Rose!”

Kimiko squinted. “So, you’re really asking him to keep up with patriarchal traditions then.”

“Yeah, you’re not gonna win this one”, Omi said, shaking his head, hand still raised.

“Damn right—”

Before Raimundo could continue, Jack interrupted. “Do you guys actually want anything? Other than to torture me, of course?”

“That’s a tough choice”, Kimiko said. “I don’t know, I think I’d get something fruity and sugary and…”

Tuning the annoying heiress out, Jack tried to remind himself that it was only a few more hours till his shift was over.

“Here she comes”, Raimundo said, breaking Jack’s out of his thoughts. “The love of my life.”

Jack followed the other boy’s line of sight and saw a group of three girls walking to a booth to the far right. He squinted a little, unsure of how to proceed. Something seemed odd about Raimundo’s certainty.

“I’m guessing it’s the girl with the blue shoes”, Jack began. “But how do you even know that part with the whole love of your life thing? Are some of you psychic?”

Kimiko sighed, while Omi shook his head, deciding to speak. “No, for Raimundo, every pretty person within a ten mile radius is the love of his life…until reality sets in.”

“Couldn’t have said it better myself”, Clay said.

Jack smirked. “Oh, payback is going to be sweet, won’t it?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”, Raimundo said, turning to give their frenemy a condescending look.

“It just means I’ll ruin your chances with her. I wouldn’t even have to lie or anything—all I’d have to say is what you guys really do in that temple.”

Kimiko side-eyed him. “So? Who the fuck told you we were on some hero secret identity type of bullshit?”

“Fine”, Jack said, shrugging. “Plan B, then. I’ll expose the fact you’re an asshole and that’ll ruin—”

“Dude, dude, listen”, Raimundo interrupted. “Okay, it was funny the first time, but now you just sound stupid. How can I expl—girls who like guys are just into me, you know?”

“Isn’t that assumptive?”

“It’s not, it’s true. It’s actually kind of a curse; sometimes you just want to focus on dating guys for a while and they won’t leave you alone.”

He shrugged, smirking. “C’est la vie, I guess!”

“La vie”, Jack repeated, deadpanned. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get you your sugary shit and then I’m going over to that girl to ruin your chances. Later.”

Before Jack could really walk away, Clay gave Kimiko a look. “You’re really getting a smoothie at an ice-cream parlor, Kim? At least, get a decent milkshake!”

“I’d love that but I’m not sure they have lactose-free milkshakes”, Kimiko said, shrugging. “Jack, if your milkshakes are lactose-free, get me one of that instead.”

“Fine”, Jack said, biting the inside of his cheek. “Cowboy, I thought you’ve been on my side this whole day.”

Omi snorted. “No one’s on your side here, Jack Spicer.”

“Right”, Jack said, mouth barely moving. “Now I remember why I hate you guys.”

Ten minutes later, Jack came back to the Dragons’ table with a chocolate milkshake, again hearing bits and pieces from a conversation he was sure was exciting and weird.

“—But yeah, she didn’t listen to me”, Kimiko said, shrugging. “So she bought her boyfriend that necklace and then discovered he bought her the same thing, except you know, he had her name engraved and shit.”

While Clay and Omi shared looks that said they were extremely weirded out, Jack rolled his eyes for a completely different reason. “New money.”

At that, Kimiko rolled her eyes. “Musty money.”

“I’ll hold the slander because I’m still on the clock”, Jack said, teeth grit. “Here’s your milkshake and…hey, where’s Captain Airhead?”

Clay pointed at the table further away. “Over there, chatting up—and I loosely quote—the love of his life.”

Leaning against the booth, Jack took a look at the far away table. Sure enough, there was Raimundo talking and laughing with the girl in the blue shoes and her friends, all with smiles on their faces at the—_ugh_—charm.

“I give it three days”, he finally said, as sarcastically as possible.

Kimiko scoffed. “You’re being generous. Two days from me.”

“And you’re not”, Jack said. “You’ve been here for, like, what six hours? Can you just leave already?”

Omi rolled his eyes at this. “_Please_. We haven’t even been here that long; we’re just enjoying our ice-creams…and our milkshakes and our sundaes and our lava-cakes.”

“You didn’t even order those last two things.”

“We are now”, Kimiko said, turning back to him with a smile. “Chop-chop, Richie Rich!”

“I truly hate you”, Jack said, matter-of-factly. “Please know that.”

Two more hours later, Jack had finally had it. Those Xiaolin losers ordered and re-ordered everything on that menu and then some, but of course, it got worse.

They then proceeded to tell him to up the aircon—_no, no_, turn down the aircon. Could he move them to another booth. No, _sorry_, they meant another _table_. This ice is too cold but—oh no, now this soda is too warm. Could he please fix that? _Pretty please_?

For what it’s worth, Jack really tried to hold back his anger. He actually did this time. He’d suppressed all urges of calling for his Jack-bots, of spilling ice-creams and milkshakes on the Dragons’ heads, of _actually_ _going_ _ballistic_ and using the only Wu he had on him.

Admirably, Jack had only settled for some petty insults and graphic curse words that got him a few stares from the family tables around the losers. He couldn’t care less for those feedback forms, though.

“You know”, Raimundo said, taking a spoonful of his third ice-cream. “You should be nicer to us. Customer satisfaction is very important for a first day on the job.”

Jack gave him a look. “Yeah? And you should _fuck off_ and leave me alone.”

“Jack, Jack”, Kimiko said, clicking her tongue. “That’s rude.”

Clay sighed, though a little smirk on his mouth meant he was going to play along. “Yeah, Jack, c’mon. Wouldn’t wanna lose your favorite customers, would ya?”

“Favorite _to who_?”, Jack said, raising an eyebrow. “If I were the owner, I’d have given you a lifetime ban from the shop.”

Omi laughed and pointed to a faraway wall. “Well, luckily, you’re not the owner. Mrs. Cho _loves_ us!”

Turning around, Jack saw a bulletin board where Mrs. Cho had stuck up countless polaroid photos of many different customers, her favorite according to the Best Customers title she’d put on top of the board.

He hoped Omi was lying. He truly, desperately did. Sadly, though, the more Jack squinted, the clearer he could see the photo smack dab in the middle of the board.

And yes, the losers were in it, all lined-up around Mrs. Cho, dressed in some seasonal getup, which only meant that they did come here often. Slowly, Jack saw his career at this ice-cream parlor panning out in front of him.

He could very well see the Xiaolin Dragons every loving day of his life. Not only that, he’d have to serve them. Willingly and happily, too.

And that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

“Okay, you wanna do this?”, Jack said, turning back around and throwing his apron on the floor, shocking many customers. “Let’s do it!”

Taking a big dramatic pause, the evil teen genius put his hands on hips. “New Money, Trailer Trash, Annie, Beauty Queen!”

“Jack”, Raimundo began, sighing exasperatedly, not as insulted as the others. “_Please_. You gotta _stop_ hitting on me, you already know I don’t date white boys.”

The redhead sighed, rolling his eyes. “Trailer Trash _is_ you, _idiot_. You know, because you lived in a trailer when you were a _circus freak_.”

“So”, Kimiko began, drawing out the word. “Beauty Queen is Clay, right?”

Cheeks stinging, Jack made a face. “No, _no_—you know what, fuck you!”

“Hey, does that mean I’m Annie?”, Omi asked, scrunching his nose. “That’s incredibly insensitive of you, Jack. Even _you_ wouldn’t go that low.”

“Well, I did!”

Clay shrugged. “How come I’m the only one who didn’t get an insult-insult? I’m feeling a bit left out.”

“Oh, are you now, bumpkin?”, Jack began, snorting. “Maybe you should play your banjo and do some hog-wrestling and you’ll be good for the day.”

The cowboy gave his friends a look. “Okay, he’s back.”

Infuriated by Clay’s tone and the jabs the others were taking at him and, really, everything that had happened this entire day—including that fight with his dad—Jack finally kicked off and ran for the syrup counter.

“Don’t do anything you’ll regret”, Kimiko warned, glaring at the boy. “This is a very delicate sweater, Jack, I swear on Dashi I _will_—”

Before she could finish her sentence, Jack rolled his eyes and squeezed the bottle of syrup so hard he emptied its contents. Directly at Kimiko’s said precious sweater.

“Wait a minute, wait a minute”, Jack began, cackling. “I’ve always wanted to say this—so, so, how do you like _them_ apples!”

Still gasping from the chocolate syrup drenching her face and sweater, Kimiko took a few minutes before she groaned. Not just a frustrated groan, Jack noticed. Oh no, that was an angry groan that turned into an angry yell. An I’ll-tear-you-limb-to-limb yell.

“Oh-oh”, Jack said, taking a step back. “What is—”

Omi gave him a look. “Yeah, you’ll want to run. So will everyone else here. Please leave and drive safe.”

Needing no further instructions, the other customers cleared the parlor, hurrying out of their seats to avoid what would happen next and with good reason. Kimiko was now exhaling fire.

“Thank you, Omi”, Kimiko said, breathing a little. “Now, there will be no witnesses to the murder I’m about to execute.”

Jack’s eyes widened as he sprinted and leapt to hide behind his counter. “Oh my God, stop her!”

“Stop her?”, Raimundo said, laughing a little. “Dude, I’m fucking _helping_ her. Food fight!”

Unsure if he’d heard correctly, Jack peered from above the counter. “What do you mean, food fi—”

Before he could finish his words, a load of syrup, different flavors too, hit him straight in the face. Gasping a little, Jack wiped his face and squinted his eyes to see just what the fuck was going on.

In front of him, Jack could see the losers, all standing in fighting stances he knew and hated with syrup bottles held like guns in their hands. Not only that, somehow, it seemed like Omi had gotten his hands on an ice-cream box and a scooper.

“Oh, we’re doing this”, Jack said. “But FYI, if I die because any of you used peanut-butter syrup on me, my parents _will_ sue.”

“Fine”, Kimiko said with a shrug. “We’ll avoid that one. Now, _run_.”

Surprisingly enough, that food fight, as very angry and too aggressive as it became, was the most fun Jack had had in a while. It last almost an hour and it only ended because, _well_, the teenagers had all run out of ammo.

Drenched in syrup and ice-cream and also some sprinkles, Raimundo still gave a menacing glare when he wanted to.

“What do you mean you ran out of ice-cream? Check in the back, I’m on a roll!”

“There _is_ no back”, Jack repeated, out-yelling the other boy. “I told you we already finished the extra ice-cream _and_ the _backup_!”

“Well”, a very messy Omi said, sighing as he took a seat at one of the only tables that still remained upright. “That’s a bummer.”

Clay nodded, taking a seat too. “Yeah, I hear you, partner. Haven’t laughed like that in ages!”

Scoffing, Jack shared a few looks with the other two teenagers as they all took spaced-yet-nearby seats.

The evil teen genius took a look to survey the damage and, if he were being honest, yikes wasn’t a big enough word to cover it.

The tables were messy and about half of them fell, turned into spur of the moment barricades, while others were kind of destroyed beyond repair. The chairs were all, without exception, sticky. Jack was positive the fight stains even reached the ceilings, somehow.

“I’m glad you’re all having fun with my misery”, Jack said, sarcastically.

Raimundo snorted. “Don’t act like you didn’t have fun. You were straight up cackling like the little hyena you are.”

“I mean, going batshit crazy with ice-cream will get a rise out of me anytime, but…just look at the place. When Mrs. Cho comes back, I’m _fucked_.”

“Let’s be real, though, you were probably fucked from the beginning”, Kimiko said. “You have zero coordination skills.”

A pause. “No, but seriously, Jack, why are you working here? Aren’t you rich?”

“That’s what I said”, Raimundo said, shrugging. “Not that I got an answer.”

Clay looked intrigued. “I’ll admit, I was wondering about this myself.”

“So, what?”, Jack asked. “You all wanna know why I’m working here now? What, do you have nothing better to do?”

“_Yes_”, Omi said, deadpan. “We spent an entire afternoon annoying you here for the hell of it. Spill, now.”

Jack groaned. “Fine. If you must know, I got into this big fight with my dad all about how I need to more responsible and less careless about money and yadda-yadda—you know, _parents_.”

“So?”, Omi asked, curiously. “What happened next?”

The evil teen genius. “What do you think, munchkin? He made me look for a job and here I am.”

A pause. “Or, I guess here I was.”

Right then and there, as if on cue, Mrs. Cho decided to walk into her ice-cream parlor—or what used to be her parlor, Jack guessed—and saw the damage first-hand. The old lady didn’t really compute the sight at first, muttering in a frenzied Cantonese.

“Just what”, Mrs. Cho finally said in English. “What the hell happened here?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Jack saw the losers all turning to look in one particular direction, as if trained to do so. Intrigued, he did the same and saw that he was looking at the one person who could get them out of this mess.

Smiling sheepishly, Kimiko took out a credit card out of her pocket.

“Lifetime ban, Mrs. Cho?”

“Oh”, the woman said, glaring with hands on her hip. “You fucking bet.”

Jack gave Clay a look. “Told you.”

**Author's Note:**

> if you ever read anything I write, just assume:
> 
> -Clay and Omi are both gay, Kimiko and Raimundo are bi
> 
> -Omi is biracial (Nigerian (Yoruba) and Chinese)
> 
> -Raimundo is a Black Brazilian
> 
> -Kimiko is always a bad fucking bitch and it's always in a good way


End file.
